Unit VII:Cognition

Module 33

Forgetting, Memory Construction & Memory Improvement

Forgetting 33-1

Encoding Failure

We cannot remember what we do not encode.

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Storage Decay

• Poor durability of stored memories leads to their decay.

• Ebbinghaus’ research:

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Retrieval Failure

Although the information is retained in the memory store, it cannot be accessed.

Tip-of-the-tongue is a retrieval failure phenomenon: Given a cue (What makes blood cells red?) the subject says the

word begins with an H (hemoglobin).

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Interference 33-1

Amnesia

• Anterograde amnesia – can recall the past, but cannot form new memories

• Some people with anterograde amnesia can form new implicit memories (how to do something), but will have no conscious recall of learning the new skill

• Retrograde amnesia – cannot recall the past (memories stored in long-term memory)

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Repression

• Sigmund Freud suggested that we may banish unpleasant memories from our consciousness as a defense mechanism

• Current research indicates that this rarely, if ever, occurs

• Memories of traumatic experiences are often the most challenging to forget

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Memory Construction Errors 33-2

Memory Construction

• Memory is not precise: we infer our past from stored information plus what we imagined later, expected, saw, and heard

• Information acquired after an event alters memory of the event; we often construct memories as we encode them and every time we “replay” them

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Misinformation Effect

• When exposed to misleading information, we tend to misremember

• When it was falsely suggested to university students that they became ill as children after eating spoiled egg salad, they became less likely to eat egg salad sandwiches

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Misinformation

Elizabeth Loftus’s research:

Group A: How fast were the cars going when they hit each other?

Group B: How fast were the cars going when they smashed into each other?

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Memory Construction

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10

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Group A (hit) Group B (Smashed into)

Verb

Bro

ke

n G

las

s?

(%

)

A week later they were asked: Was there any broken glass?

Group B (smashed into) reported more broken glass than Group A (hit).

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Source Amnesia

• Attributing an event that we experienced, heard, read, or imagined to the wrong source.

• Source amnesia also helps explain déjà vu.

?

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Eyewitness Testimony

• Memory construction helps explain why 79% of 200 convicts exonerated later by DNA testing had been misjudged based on faulty eyewitness testimony

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Children’s Eyewitness Recall 33-3

Children’s Eyewitness Recall

• Children’s eyewitness recall can be unreliable if leading questions are posed.

• However, if questioned in neutral words they can understand, children often accurately recall what happened to them.

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Consensus on Childhood Abuse

1. Injustice happens.

2. Incest and other sexual abuse happens.

3. People may forget.

4. Recovered memories are commonplace.

5. Recovered memories under hypnosis or drugs are unreliable.

6. Memories of things happening before 3 years of age are unreliable.

7. Memories, whether real or false, can be emotionally upsetting.

Leading psychological associations of the world agreeon the following concerning childhood sexual abuse:

p. 351-352

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Improving Memory 33-4

Improving Memory

1. Study repeatedly to boost long-term recall.

2. Spend more time rehearsing or actively thinking about the material.

3. Make material personally meaningful. *mindlessly repeating someone else’s words

while taking notes is relatively ineffective*

4. Use mnemonic devices:a) associate with something already

storedb) make up a storyc) chunk — acronyms

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Improving Memory

5. Activate retrieval cues — mentally recreate

the situation and mood.

6. Recall events while they are fresh — before

you encounter misinformation.

7. Minimize interference:a) Test your own knowledge.

b) Rehearse and then determine

what you do not yet know.

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