Remembering & Forgetting

1. Remembering & Forgetting

2. Recall vs. Recognition • Recall • Retrieving previously learned information without the aid of or with very few external cues • Recognition • Identifying previously learned information with the help of more external cues

3. Forgetting Curve • Measures the amount of previously learned information that subjects can recall across time • Ebbinghaus • One of the 1st psychologists to study memory & forgetting • He tested his own memory of nonsense syllables

4. 4 Reasons for Forgetting • Repression • Mental process that automatically hides emotionally threatening or anxiety-producing information in the unconscious • Poor Retrieval Cues • Retrieval cues are mental reminders that we create by forming vivid mental images or creating associations between new information & information we already know • Amnesia • Loss of memory due to a blow or damage to the brain after drug use or after severe psychological stress • Interference • Recall of a memory is blocked by other related memories

5. 2 Types of Interference • Proactive • Old information blocks the remembering of new information • Retroactive • New information blocks the remembering of old information

6. Retrieval Cues • Mental reminders that you create by forming vivid mental images of information or associating new information with information that you already know • State Dependent Learning • It is easier to recall information when you are in the same physiological or emotional state or setting as when you originally learned the information

7. Location of Memories in the Brain (cont.)

8. Location of Memories in the Brain • Cortex • Thin layer of brain cells that cover the surface of the forebrain • Amygdala • Almond-shaped structure lying below the surface of the cortex in the tip of the temporal lobe • Plays a critical role in adding a wide range of emotions to our memories • Hippocampus • Curved, finger-like structure that lies beneath the cortex in the temporal lobe • Transfers declarative information (words, facts & events) from STM into LTM

9. Can False Memories Be Implanted? • Researchers interviewed parents about events that occurred in their children’s lives during the past 12 months • Each 3- to 6-year-old was read a list of these events including some fictitious events • Children were asked to “think hard” & identify the events that actually happened Bar graph data from “Repeatedly Thinking About a Non-Event: Source Misattributions Among Pre-Schoolers,” by S. J. Ceci, M. L. C. Huffman, E. Smith & E. Loftus, 1994, Consciousness and Cognition, 3, 388-407.

10. How Accurate is an Eyewitness? • Own-Race Bias • Researchers found that an eyewitness of one race is less accurate when identifying an accused person of another race • Confidence • 6 reviews of studies concluded that there is a weak relationship between correct identification & level of witness confidence

11. Can Questions Change the Answers? • Did the car pass the barn? • After watching a film segment, subjects were asked, “How fast was the red sports car going when it passed the barn?” • Although there was no barn in the film, 17% of subjects reported seeing a barn • Was there a stop sign? • Subjects were shown slides of a traffic accident involving a stop sign & asked questions about what they saw • Some subjects were asked misleading questions about a yield sign instead of a stop sign • Subjects who had been given misleading questions were more likely to report seeing a yield sign than subjects who were not misled