Lectures for PSY 108 midterm 2

Sensory and Working Memory

• Sensory Memory Definition: Large capacity, same modality as experience, and very fast decay.
• Methods to Study Sensory Memory:
  • Span of Apprehension: Measures the amount of information one can apprehend at a glance.
  • Sperling Partial Report Paradigm: Demonstrates that sensory memory holds more information than can be reported at once.
  • Dilloo Missing Dot Technique: Provides insight into the temporal characteristics of sensory memory.

Function of Sensory Memory

• Acts as a buffer for stimuli received through the senses, retaining impressions long enough for relevant details to be extracted and processed.
• Challenges to Sensory Memory:
  • Limited functionality (Haber)
  • Difficulty in distinguishing sensory memory from other stages of memory and determining the precise mechanisms involved.

Echoic Memory

• Definition: The auditory counterpart to visual sensory memory, responsible for holding auditory information for a short period.
• Measurement: Often assessed using tasks where participants must recall auditory stimuli presented briefly.
• Comparison: Echoic memory lasts longer (2-4 seconds) than iconic memory (less than 1 second) but both serve as initial stages in the memory process.

Short-term and Long-term Memory Distinctions

• Neurocognitive Evidence:
  • HM (Milner) had no transfer to long-term memory due to hippocampi destruction.
  • Clive Wearing had no transfer to long-term memory due to severe anterograde amnesia.
  • JB had impaired short-term memory due to frontal and parietal lobe damage.
• Behavioral Evidence:
  • Brown/Peterson paradigm: Demonstrates the duration limits of short-term memory by showing rapid decay without rehearsal.
  • Serial position curve: Reveals primacy (LTM) and recency (STM) effects, influenced by the order of item presentation.

Working Memory Approach

• Model: Proposed by Baddeley and Hitch, consisting of multiple components including the central executive, phonological loop, visuospatial sketchpad, and episodic buffer.
• Components:
  • Central executive: Oversees and coordinates cognitive processes.
  • Cognitive load: Refers to the amount of working memory resources required by a task.
  • Phonological store: Handles verbal and auditory information.
  • Visual-spatial sketchpad: Manages visual and spatial data.
  • Episodic buffer: Integrates information across domains.

Big Picture Conclusions

• Memory Filtering: Most information in sensory memory does not reach short-term memory, and most short-term memory content does not transition into long-term memory.
• Working Memory: Like a computer's RAM or a desktop workspace, working memory is where active processing occurs, involving components like the visual-spatial sketchpad and phonological store.
• Sensory Memory Types: Both sensory and working memory consist of multiple types distinguished by sensory modality, such as visual sensory memory (iconic) and auditory sensory memory (echoic).### Memory Aids
• Rhymes: Using rhyming words or phrases to aid memory, e.g., "I before E, except after C" to remember spelling rules.
• Catch phrases: Memorable phrases or sayings that encapsulate information, e.g., "Roy G.Biv" to remember the colors of the rainbow.
• List order acronyms: Creating an acronym from the first letters of a list of items, e.g., "HOMES" to remember the Great Lakes.

Prospective Memory

• Definition: The ability to remember to perform a planned action or intention at the appropriate future time.
• Example: Remembering to take medicine at a specific time each day.
• Implementation intentions: Creating specific plans about when and how one will achieve a goal to increase the likelihood of remembering and performing a future task.

Mental Imagery

• Definition: Mental experience of seeing, hearing, touching an object in the absence of any sensory input.
• History: Binet's use of patients with brain damage, imagining a movement activates motor processing, and imagining a form or color draws on object recognition or color systems.

The Perky Effect

• Participants imagined an object while fixating on a blank screen, and a faint image of the object was projected onto the screen.
• Participants believed they were imagining the projected images rather than actually perceiving them.

Dual Coding Hypothesis

• There are two codes in the brain, one verbal and one visual.
• Evidence: Paivio's studies showed that memory for concrete words (e.g., potato, horse) is better than for abstract words (e.g., justice, love).

Imagery Debate

• Analog view (Kosslyn): Information is stored as images, and images are functional in thinking.
• Propositional view (Pylyshyn): Information is stored as propositions, and images are "epiphenomenal" (secondary).
• Evidence for each side:
  • Analog view: Relative image size, relative distances, and rotation studies.
  • Propositional view: Limitations to imagery, such as the penny example and inability to reinterpret images.

Imagery and the Brain

• Brain areas active when viewing and imagining letters are the same (Farah).
• Mental rotation activates the parietal cortex proportional to the angle of rotation.
• Brain damage affecting vision also impacts imagery (Bisiach and Luzzatti, 1978).

Cognitive Maps

• Definition: Internal representations of the environment used for navigation, staying oriented, and giving directions.
• Example: Navigating through a familiar city or building.
• Developed through learned maps and direct experience in the environment.
• Used for navigation, staying oriented, and giving directions.
• Errors occur due to systematic simplifications, such as the rotation heuristic, alignment heuristic, hierarchical representations, and border bias.

Individual Differences

• Route representations vs survey representations.
• Differences in navigation strategies and accuracy, assessed by tools like the Santa Barbara Sense-of-Direction Scale.

Sensory and Working Memory

• Sensory Memory: large capacity, same modality as experience, and very fast decay
  • Refers to the initial stage of memory processing, where information is held briefly before being processed or forgotten
• Methods to Study Sensory Memory:
  • Span of Apprehension: measures the amount of information one can take in at a glance
  • Sperling Partial Report Paradigm: demonstrates the capacity and duration of sensory memory
  • Dilloo Missing Dot Technique: provides insight into the temporal characteristics of sensory memory
• Function of Sensory Memory: acts as a buffer for stimuli, retaining impressions long enough for relevant details to be extracted and processed
• Echoic Memory: the auditory counterpart to visual sensory memory, responsible for holding auditory information for a short period
  • Measured using the partial report paradigm with auditory information
  • Lasts longer than iconic memory (2-4 seconds vs. less than 1 second)

Short-Term Memory and Long-Term Memory

• Neurocognitive Evidence: studies on HM and Clive Wearing demonstrate the distinction between short-term and long-term memory
• Behavioral Evidence: Brown/Peterson paradigm, serial position curve, and interference effects demonstrate the duration limits of short-term memory
• Neuroimaging Evidence: different brain areas are activated during recall, supporting distinct processing mechanisms
• Atkinson and Shiffrin's Model: describes memory as a flow of information through sensory registers, short-term memory, and long-term memory
  • Evidence: rehearsal improves recall, supporting the notion of transfer from short-term to long-term memory

Working Memory

• Model: proposed by Baddeley and Hitch, consisting of multiple components, including the central executive, phonological loop, visuospatial sketchpad, and episodic buffer
• Components:
  • Central Executive: oversees and coordinates cognitive processes
  • Cognitive Load: refers to the amount of working memory resources required by a task
  • Phonological Store: handles verbal and auditory information
  • Visual-Spatial Sketchpad: manages visual and spatial data
  • Episodic Buffer: integrates information across domains

Long-Term Memory

• Three Aspects of Long-Term Memory:
  • Encoding: processes that enable information to be transferred from short-term memory to long-term memory
  • Retention: processes that occur after encoding, influencing whether the material is later available
  • Retrieval: processes that occur at the time of recall, influencing the accessibility of stored information
• Encoding:
  • Depth of Processing: refers to the idea that memory retention depends on the depth of processing
  • Self-Reference Effect: information related to oneself is better remembered
  • Generation Effect: information is better remembered if it is actively generated from one's own mind
  • Schemas: cognitive frameworks that help organize and interpret information
• Retention:
  • Spacing Effect: learning is more effective when study sessions are spaced out over time
  • Passage of Time: memory can fade over time due to decay or interference
  • Sleep: plays a crucial role in memory consolidation
  • Post-Event Information: new information can influence the recall of past events
• Retrieval:
  • State Dependent Memory: memory retrieval is most effective when an individual is in the same physiological state as when the memory was encoded
  • Mood Dependent Memory: memory retrieval is enhanced when an individual's mood at the time of retrieval matches their mood during encoding
  • Context Dependent Memory: memory retrieval is improved when the context present at encoding and retrieval is the same

Metacognition and Memory Strategies

• Meta-Cognition: refers to one's knowledge about their own cognitive processes
• Meta-Memory: one's knowledge about their own memory
• Types of Metamemory Judgments:
  • Predicting future memory performance
  • At encoding (judgments of learning, ease of learning, paired associative judgments)
  • At retrieval (tip of the tongue, assessing the source of one's memory)
• Memory Strategies:
  • Systematic vs. Heuristic Processing
  • Source Monitoring: assessing the source of one's memory
  • Types of Processing: encoding, retention, and retrieval
  • Factors Influencing Source Monitoring Performance: distinguishability, similarity, and application of basic principles

Memory Improvement Strategies

• Principles Related to Encoding:
  • Transfer to LTM
  • Rehearsal
  • Generation Effect
  • Depth of Processing
  • Self-Reference Effect
  • Multiple Codes
  • Schemas
  • Distinctiveness
• Principles Related to Retention Interval:
  • Delay
  • Judgments of Learning
  • Spacing Effect
  • Interference
• Principles Related to Retrieval:
  • Encoding Specificity
  • Associative Memory Structures
  • Schematicity
• Specific Techniques for Memory Improvement:
  • Keyword Mnemonic
  • Link System
  • Method of Loci### Memory Aids
• Rhymes: Using rhyming words or phrases to aid memory, e.g., "I before E, except after C" to remember spelling rules.
• Catch phrases: Memorable phrases or sayings that encapsulate information, e.g., "Roy G.Biv" to remember the colors of the rainbow.
• List order acronyms: Creating an acronym from the first letters of a list of items, e.g., "HOMES" to remember the Great Lakes.

Prospective Memory

• Definition: The ability to remember to perform a planned action or intention at the appropriate future time.
• Example: Remembering to take medicine at a specific time each day.
• Improvement strategy: Implementation intentions, which involves creating specific plans about when and how one will achieve a goal.

Mental Imagery

• Definition: Mental experience of seeing, hearing, touching an object in the absence of any sensory input.
• History: Binet's use of patients with brain damage, showing that imagining a movement activates motor processing, and imagining a form or color draws on object recognition or color systems.

Dual Coding Hypothesis

• Definition: There are two codes in the brain, one verbal and one visual.
• Supporting evidence: Paivio's studies, showing that memory for concrete words is better than for abstract words.
• Interference studies: Visual imagery interferes with other visual tasks, and verbal tasks interfere with other verbal tasks, but visual imagery does not interfere with verbal tasks.

Propositions vs. Images

• Propositions: Abstract, essential meanings that do not resemble what they stand for (e.g., "A canary is a bird").
• Images: Resemble what they stand for (analog code).
• Analog view (images are functional): Information is stored as images, and images are functional in thinking.
• Propositional view (images are “epiphenomenal”): Information is stored as propositions, and images are secondary.

Evidence for the Debate

• Relative image size: Reaction time to identify features is longer when the object is imagined next to a larger or smaller object.
• Relative distances (scanning studies): Scanning time between objects in a mental image is proportional to the distance between them.
• Rotation (mental transformations): Reaction time to determine if objects are the same is proportional to the amount of rotation required.

Limitations to Imagery

• Penny example: People struggle to recall specific details of a common object.
• Images cannot always be reinterpreted: Participants could not reinterpret a mental image of a rabbit-duck figure, but could do so when drawing it.

Imagery and the Brain

• Brain imaging studies: Same brain areas are active when viewing and imagining letters.
• Mental rotation: Activates the parietal cortex proportional to the angle of rotation.
• Brain damage: Affects vision and imagery, as shown by Bisiach and Luzzatti (1978).

Cognitive Maps

• Definition: Internal representations of the environment used for navigation, staying oriented, and giving directions.
• Example: Navigating through a familiar city or building.
• Development: Learned from maps and direct experience in the environment.
• Use: For navigation, staying oriented, and giving directions.
• Accuracy: Often inaccurate due to systematic simplifications.
• Errors: Due to organizing principles, such as the rotation heuristic, alignment heuristic, hierarchical representations, and border bias.

Individual Differences

• Route representations vs. Survey representations: Different navigation strategies and accuracy.
• Spatial ability and sense of direction: Assessed by tools like the Santa Barbara Sense-of-Direction Scale.