Please look though the 'Memory Observed" book. Find a chapter that interests you.
State what the chapter is and breifly discuss the main topics and concepts that were brought up in the chapter.
What are some questions you have after reading the chapter?
Next go to your textbook and see what it has to say about the topics raised in the chapter. This might be difficult so if there is even something remotely similar in the text go ahead and read up on that. When you have done this, please respond to the following questions.
What did your text have to say about the topics raised in this chapter? What information was provided in the text? What additional details did your text provide?
What did you think about this chapter? Why? What are three things you will remember from what you read in the chapter? Why? What was one thing that you really liked that was in the chapter? Why? What was one thing that you disliked that was in the chapter? Why? What do you now know about your brain that you didn't know before reading the chapter? Has this chapter made you think about other issues related to cognitive psychology? How does this chapter (if at all) relate to the material in the AoM chapters?
Please make sure you use the terms, terminology and concepts you have learned so far in the class. It should be apparent from reading your post that you are a college student well underway in a course in psychology.
Include a list of the terms and concepts you used in your post. (example - Terms: memory, cortex, visual system....)
Please use spaces between your paragraphs to make your post easier to read - thanks in advance
Let me know if you have any questions.
After skimming through the glossary of our Memory Observed book chapter five, Early Childhood, seemed of most interest to me. The main concepts in this chapter included early childhood experiences, memory and childhood amnesia, autobiographical memory, offset of childhood amnesia, and false memories of childhood experiences. The main topic was about childhood amnesia and our early childhood memories. There are several brief personal childhood stories that are shared throughout the chapter. These stories have helped researchers determine at what age childhood amnesia seems to take effect and offset. Also, the childhood experiences shared in chapter five help us make sense of children’s behavior.
After reading this chapter, I had further questions about our ability to recall childhood events and memories. I wanted to learn why it was easier for some adults to recall childhood events than it is for others. Also, I wonder if there is a way to improve a child’s memory so they are able to recall their childhood experiences more easily in the future.
The first concept my cognitive textbook discusses is infantile amnesia. This term describes the inability to recall events that happened when we were very young. In most cases, we are not able to recall any experiences that may have happened to us before the age of 5 and it is very rare for someone to remember many memories before age 3. Chapter five from the Memory Observed book discusses that most childhood events that are recalled stem from significant events such as a birth of a sibling. Often times, young children are able to understand that their mother is pregnant and they are going have a new sibling into their life. During the pregnancy and after the birth of the new baby, the older sibling usually experiences jealously, loneliness, and are saddened from the less attention received from their mom. These types of childhood experiences are easier for adults to recall because of the overwhelming emotions they had. Within my text it says that some adults can recall the birth of sibling when they were only at the age of 2.
Autobiographical memory was also a concept discussed in my cognitive textbook. Our autobiographical memories do not recall what exactly happened in a memory, instead, we remember the construction or reconstruction of what happened in the memory. Autobiographical memory is better at different periods in life yet is still subject to distortions. Some additional information from my text suggests different ways in which we can study autobiographical memory. Diary studies and important experiences over a long period of time are just two ways that can help us measure our autobiographical memory.
I really enjoyed this chapter partly because I have a passion for working with young children. I thought this chapter had very useful information that helped me gain a better understanding about my own ability to recall childhood events and experiences. A concept that I’ll remember from this chapter will be that a children’s bitter behavior or aggressiveness often comes from a recent experience or change in their family. For example, children will throw things and demonstrate destructive behavior to release their jealously of a new sibling. Another concept I’ll remember is that the type of narrative construction used towards children will help their memory process. An elaborative technique, talk about episodes in narrative terms of what happened when, where, and with whom proves to be more successful versus the pragmatic technique which refers to memory in instrumental terms. Lastly, I’ll remember the concept of false memories of childhood events. This was a new concept for me to learn about. I’ve learned that some of our false recalls can be explained as source confusion. A false event might be a personal memory rather than something that was recorded by the parent and learned about.
My favorite part of the chapter was reading about the personal stories from individuals that reflect their experience of a new sibling being born. Since I am the youngest of three, I've never had to experience the jealousy or loneliness after a new sibling is born. The childhood memories that were shared in this chapter were very vivid. Also, after I worked in a daycare for three years I was well aware of the jealousy and behavior changes in children who are expecting to have a new sibling. This was my favorite part to read about because it helped me understand how some of the aggressive and destructive behaviors we see in young children are really a signal that they are releasing built up tension, stress, jealousy, and many more emotions.
The offset of childhood amnesia concept seemed more boring to read about versus the other concepts in this chapter. However, I did learn that results from several experiments have shown that an event that occurs when a participant is younger than three years old is possible to be recalled in adulthood. Also, there seems to be a steep offset of childhood amnesia during the first half of the 3rd year of life. Personally, this part of the chapter wasn't nearly as interesting to read about compared to the other aspects of chapter five.
After reading this chapter I've gained a better insight of how our brains are constantly developing and growing from the day we are born. As our brains develop more we are able to store more memories. Therefore, many of us struggle to recall childhood experiences because our brains were still growing at the time. I also learned that we can help our brains recall memories better with different techniques such as the elaborative technique. This chapter relates to some of the stories we have read in AoM. Though we haven't read about many cases reflecting children's memory, we have read cases about short term and long term memory. In most of these cases, the individuals suffered brain damage which then leads to their inability to recall events, names, faces, and memories suffered.
Terms: infantile amnesia, autobiographical memory, elaborative and pragmatic techniques, false childhood events, STM, LTM
The first chapter I chose tells about flashbulb memories. This type of memory is one of the types of autobiographical memory that is formed within special circumstances. The concept was first presented by Roger Brown and James Kulik in 1977.
Flashbulb memories are formed in response to highly emotional events, when the average level of surprise and emotional arousal of a stimulus exceed certain limit. An example might be 9/11 or the assassination of President J. Kennedy; a death of a close relative or a friend, etc. Some features make this type of memory special. First, flashbulb memories are believed to be more resistant to forgetting processes. Second, the memory is connected not to the event itself, but to the circumstances in which a person first got the news. Finally, it is suggested that flashbulb memories are based on a special neurological mechanism that makes its formation possible.
From the resent researches we still cannot conclude whether flashbulb memory is so much different from other memory mechanisms. Some neurological data provide evidence in favor of this hypothesis: while long-term memory for emotionally-neutral effect is significantly related to medial-frontal lobe functioning, the flashbulb memories do not show that correlation. As long as flashbulb memory is connected to emotional respond, it is obvious that amygdala plays certain role in the mechanism as well. At the same moment some researchers suggest that this type of memories is formed due to the fact that we tend recall highly significant events for several times and that consequently leads to its better remembrance. The phenomenon was called a narrative rehearsal hypothesis.
We know that flashbulb memories are quiet vivid for person even after several years after the event, but how accurate are they? In the second chapter I read the material about phantom flashbulb memories. It appeared to be that even flashbulb memories are exposed to forgetting. From a research in which the participants were interviewed 12 hours after the event (Challenger’s spacecraft explosion) and then several years later it became clear that for many participants memories were not accurate at all. They did not work like a photograph, but rather like a schema of the environment in which a person found out about the event. All the aspects by which the memories were collected (such as what time was it, who were there else, what did a person do, etc.,) varied widely among the participants. Thus to the present moment we still do not know what is the uniqueness of flashbulb memory, what its neurological mechanism and how it works in detail. Though empirical knowledge and some experimental researches suggest that such type of memory exists and differs from other memory mechanisms, the question is still arguable.
Terms used: flashbulb memory, phantom flashbulb memory, amygdala, narrative rehearsal hypothesis.
Reading Activity - Week #8
Chapter 35 – The Memory Wars
This chapter talked about the difference between recovered memories and false memories. There is a large debate between the two theories regarding whether or not it is possible to forget and later recover the memory of a childhood trauma and if it is possible to create false childhood memories. It also spoke about repressed memories. These supposedly recovered memories may cause a lot of problems in a person(s) life. Not only does the memory affect the child, but the families, and people involved in the situation. These memories are serious and can cause grave effects so therefore we must interpret these recovered memories very carefully. A good question that the book talked about is how we should interpret what we think is the recovered memories of a child after a childhood trauma. Another main point talked about was the idea that Naturalistic Memory research and how its lead to the start of “reasonable middle ground” that understands and acknowledges both recovered and false memories.
One main question that I have after reading this chapter is, How do we know what we are hearing is the truth? These recovered memories may be truth or false, but how do we know? How would we ever know? It is one word against another, so therefore how can you prosecute someone when you have no idea if the evidence against a person could be false and unreliable?
Breaking things down we must first understand what Recovered Memories are. Recovered Memories are the memory of events that had been forgotten or suppressed for a relatively long time. The textbook had some information regarding Recovered Memories. Freud describes repression as a very threatening or anxiety-provoking thing is unable to gain access to conscious awareness. The book did describe that the recovered memories of a childhood traumatic event are virtually impossible to understand and conclude. To support this idea, some researchers believe that children who do remember certain childhood traumatic memories are just creating them because they are under pressure from the therapists. Another reason for the forgetting of trauma from years ago could be from retrograde amnesia. Retrograde amnesia is a form of amnesia where someone is unable to recall events that occurred before the development of the amnesia. This can be an explanation for an emotional or physical trauma, or the suppression of painful memories from any cause.
Three really good points that the book talks about have to deal with the application of these topics in real life. The suppression of memories have been around for a long time and can be seen everywhere. When you think about the people locked up for something from a memory, you always wonder whether they were prosecuted for a crime that they actually committed or a false one. The book made a good point by stating that the recovering of memories can be a dangerous step to take. It can justify a person’s life or put someone in severe danger. Whether that child/person is living with the offender or if the offender holds vengeance towards the child. There are many many different possibilities so understanding the situations that you are putting the people involved in before you go about this step is very important. Another good point that the book talks about revolves around the idea that long and forgotten memories can be remembered for a variety of reasons but may not be caused by memory repression, but instead it may reflect the availability or unavailability of cues that allow for retrieval of the memory which brings it to mind. For example, seeing a child get hit might all the sudden might shoot their mind back to the memory of when their father or mother hit them and therefore they remember. One thing that I don’t like about this chapter was the idea that no matter what a child remembers, this cannot always be counted for fact. Like I talked about before, How do you know what a child is remembering is true or not? How do you distinguish between what is a real memory versus a distorted one. Also the exact details play a very important part in the offense and as we know, time can make those details hazy and unreliable. I just don’t like to think about the idea that people are getting locked away for a long time for something that a child supposedly remembers that is not true.
This chapter relates to a topic we have talked a lot about; memory. Going further, we have spoken a lot about the idea of long versus short term memories and how repetition is the main key to remembering such things. So these ideas are linked in a way.
Terms: Memory, Suppressed Memories, Recovered Memories, repressed memory, false memories, Processed Memories, naturalistic memory
I decided to read the Under Oath chapter which discusses a lot of issues with the memory and how recalling events for a trial may not be as accurate as the justice system makes it to be. I chose this chapter because I am really interested in the justice system, and I have taken a psych and law class that focused a lot on the topics raised in the chapter. Eyewittness testimony is a very interesting topic, but there was a LOT in this chapter, so I might not be able to cover it all or get crazy in depth with everything.
A good few of the chapters dealt with specific studies that dealt with testing the memory of individuals for specific events. These studies differed it situation, but came out with similar results in most of them. Most of the time it was found that people have a terrible recall for specific information based on a certain situation. Time affects this, along with other factors, and it seemed that not so much the quantity of responses, but the quality of responses decreased. Most people will try to provide more information if pressed, and will develop beliefs based on other people's suggestions or beliefs.
One chapter analyzed people who had actually been in a situation that was not a study, but a real crime. Their reports were more valid in comparison to those in the other studies, but the authors of the article thought this may be due to a flashblub experience. A flashbulb memory is a vivd recolection of some event that carries with it strong emotional reactions. The fact that they saw an actual murder instilled in them a memory that could not be forgotten. So long as a certain event had a great impact on them, it is a flashbulb memory and can be remembered easier than to just a basic everyday occurance.
A lot of the experiments done dealt with a situation that was pretty moderate and did not really intise the audience to listen. In these experiments the participants where asked some time later to recall certain things about the person involved or certain things that happened during the moments. A lot of people experienced what it called leveling. In leveling the story may lose details that are just not remembered. Unfamiliar terms and ideas might be omitted in the description, so it is almost like a certain event might not have happened. Sometimes information is inferred they the participant did not know, but thought was true based on other information they know. Sharpening, as it is referred to, happens when we remember something we were never told. It is a sort of false knowledge, but we believe it is true because it makes sense to us based on our previous knowledge.
My very favorite section was the one titled "Eyewitness Testimony" by Robert Buckhout. In this article he addressed a lot of famous studies that deal with memory and things related to psych and law. Robert talks about a person as being motivated by the desire to be accurate, but also by a desire to live up to the expectations of other people and stay in their good graces. While people can think for themselves, and memory should be based on the individual, others can impact the way we remember things and how our memories are constructed or reconstructed. The Loftus and Palmer study of the car accident and the recall by the participants with differing descriptives of the incident appeared in the text as well as the reading. With this type of situation we have a misinformation effect. A question can contain misleading information that will distort the memory. By saying the car smashed into something you may view this as more violent than it just hitting something and rearrange your memory to fit this.
When trying to evaluate children and their memories for recall, they were also being tested for persuation. The different groups in the text comprised of a control group, and groups that were influenced in different ways. When the children were told that a child had ruined a bear or book, the children started to be affected by these implanted memories. These implanted memories led to false memories that the children actually believed happened, elaborating on what exactly had happened to the book or the bear. Children in the control group, however, had a pretty good memory for what had happened and did not recal anything about a book or bear.
In one article of the reading the author mentioned his creation of a confabulation. A confabulation is a narrative account of an event that never happened. The author made up a false event and asked around town if there were people who had been on the scene, and if they could tell him exactly what happened. Some people are looking for attention and approval from others and will make up stories to be more interesting, but it is possible that some of these people believed they were there at this false event. People who take confabulation to an extreme are characteristic of Karsakoff's syndrome. With this disease, severe anterograde amnesia is present and a poor memory for recent events accompanies this. Confabulations show up in these individuals as spontaneous outpourings of recollections that the patient cannot control and cannot monitor as false.
I could keep going on and on about this chapter because I really enjoyed it, but I think this does a good sum-up for it. I really like how the chapter was structured and that it had real experiements and then discussions in the chapter, it was not just one or the other. There was not really anything I disliked about, except for that it was maybe a little bit long. There is not so much that relates in this to the Aom book because it deals with eyewitness testimony, but in one part of the book it did talk about a man who was monochromatic (could not percieve colors at all). In the chapter this man stated in his testimony about different shades of red, but he could not see color... He was filling in his testimony, making inferences about colors that he could not distinguish. Something that I did not really talk about much was the line-ups. I did not touch much on this because I have already read up a lot on it, but it is still interesting. Composing our lineups the correct way yields the difference between a complete guess and an actual recall. (Had a chance to read the article on the Buddy Holly glasses study and how none of the other people even had glasses who resembeled these type of glasses).
terms: flashbulb memory, confabulation, leveling, misinformation effect, implanted memories, false memories, karsakoff's syndrome, monochromatic
I read the very last chapter in the book entitled, “An Anthropologist on Mars.” This chapter focused on the population of those who suffer from autism. With case histories on several autistic individuals it became clear that autism has a wide range of symptoms that also range in severity level. In my opinion the case study of the woman Temple was the most interesting part of the chapter. She is autistic but still has successfully received her Ph. D and travels the world lecturing about either autism or topics related to her degree of animal science. Temple has written an autobiography and can specifically recall the feelings she experienced attached to autism at the age of two. At first I questioned how she could accurately recall such an early life memory, but it is known that autistic individuals are able to remember vivid memories from even the first year of their life at times. This chapter made me aware that what autistic individuals seem to all share a struggle in is the ability to show and read emotions. Most prefer to not be physically touched and have difficulty understanding that other people have emotions. What was upsetting to read was the fact that until the last two decades autism has been ignored in certain aspects such as causes and treatment. In the ‘60s and ‘70s most people blamed autism on bad parenting and most every autistic person was put into a mental institution with mentally unstable individuals. Although, some autistic people are mentally handicapped therapies now days like auditory desensitization and facilitated communication have helped autistic people open their minds towards normalcy. In Temple’s opinion she would never wish to not be autistic. She feels autism has shaped her to be the person she is and she believes that treatments that lead those towards normalcy may hinder their creative abilities and knowledgeable power. This chapter focused on how those with autism view the world much differently and even have different visual abilities as far as creating detailed visual imagery in their head. Temple said she had never learn to draft in her life, but after watching one man create a blueprint she was able to vividly recall the visual memory to teach herself the steps to drawing a blueprint. Autism can give a person a much enhanced memory compared to non-autistic individuals.
My main question from this chapter would be how does an average autistic individual make it through life? What are the problems they face on a day to day basis? Temple is a famous autistic person who seems to be unlike most people with autism. She has been able to get past her autistic symptoms and has made herself a successful scientist. I would also like to understand how adult autistic symptoms differ or are similar to the autistic symptoms of younger children. The chapter lightly touched on this question, but I would like a more in depth look at the answer.
After looking in my cognitive psychology textbook there were many topics covered in chapter that were relatable. For example, the chapter covered, how autism affects language production, memory, perception, attention, learning, creativity, intelligence, problem solving, language comphrension etc. After reading the chapter in the AOM book I felt that the deficit of language comprehension in autistic people was quite unique. Before reading in my cognitive psychology book I recalled Temple saying that she could never understand words that had emotional cues behind them. For example, she could not comprehend why the author, Oliver Sacks, thought the mountains and the view was breathtakingly beautiful. She just thought it was pretty, but nothing to get excited about, which showed that there was a lack of emotion about her.
Next, I began reading the part in my cognitive psychology textbook labeled language comprehension. This chapter covered topics such as word recognition, sentence comprehension, and discourse comprehension. I was immediately drawn to word recognition because I remembered reading that Temple as well as other autistic kids may have difficulty understanding specifically pronouns because it is hard for them to understand other people are full of emotions when they are used to their inability to relate to emotions. My textbook stated that word recognition is a memory problem as well as a perceptual problem (Kellogg 2003). Just that sentence alone can shed some light on how autistic kids are unable to successfully comprehend what pronouns are used for.
My textbook touched on other factors of word recognition such as the word frequency effect. Word frequency explains the reason how the frequency of a word will allow a person to recognize it either faster or slower and accurately or less accurately. A high frequency word would be recognized faster and more accurately while a low frequency word would be recognized slower and less accurately. What I found interesting is that the word frequency effect can be altered by the words’ spelling-to-sound correspondence. For example the words pack, pat, and paint all follow the same sound-to-spelling correspondence for the letter “p.” Yet, if the word phone is thrown in the sound-to-spelling correspondence throws off the speed of word recognition. All of this information is clear and makes sense in my opinion, because in my experience I agree this does occur.
Overall, I felt that this chapter in my textbook was confusing at times when it tried to discuss topics such as the connectionist models and dual-route models. One thing I did learn from the chapter was how suppositions work. According to research, in order to comprehend a negative sentence a reader first assumes the sentence in a positive form and then learns to deny it. For example, say that a police officer tells you that you are not getting a ticket. A driver may think at first they are getting a ticket but then must use a few seconds to understand that they indeed are not receiving a ticket. This is how suppositions work. The other things I remember reading about in this chapter were about inferences. Inferences are used in writing and language all the time. A type of word that relies on inferences is known as anaphora. The most widely used example of anaphora are pronouns. For example instead of typing the man’s name over and over a writer may begin to replace the man’s name with the word he. This part interested me because I was able to relate it to how autistic individuals struggle with pronouns specifically. One thing I did not like about the chapter is that it kept using the term “exception word,” which I am unaware of how it is defined within language. There were many other language terms I did not know the meaning of so it made it a very difficult chapter to comprehend. One thing I learned about my brain was the ways in which I unconsciously recognize words in a matter of split seconds, yet if the word is new to me it seems to take a lot more consciousness to recognize the word. The language chapter in my textbook relates to the chapter in the AOM book because both deal with language comprehension and how things such as word frequency, suppositions, and inferences can be used within language. It seems to be these types of factors that autistic people struggle with.
Terms: Autism, visual imagery, supposition, inferences, word frequency, word recognition, language comprehension.
"Eyewitness Testimony"
This chapter is very intriguing and starts of talking about the fact that humans are not tape recorders and the idea of someone giving a completely accurate eyewitness testimony is really farfetched (so to speak). Human perception is "sloppy and uneven," is perhaps a better way to state that. The chapter states that perception and memory are decision-making processes affected by the totality of a person's abilities, background, attitudes, motives and beliefs, by the environment, and by the way their recollection is tested. The first reason that many people may not have an accurate eyewitness testimony is due to the fact that when they were first witnessing the event unfold, they were not alarmed and did not realize the importance of what was happening yet. Therefore, they did not pay particular detail to any specific thing they saw, but then will later be asked specific questions about what happened BEFORE the event. Eyewitnesses are also asked to describe people in detail that they may have only seen for a fraction of a second. There are many other factors that play into eyewitness testimonies, such as stress, age, health, eyesight, hearing, etc.
The book talks about how people "see what they want to" and they gave an example of people being deprived of food for 24 hours and shown blurred slides (the more hungry they became the more the blurred slides looked like food to them). Sometimes people just make things up. There was an example where a journalist made up a story and had it printed in the paper, then went to visit the town where the story happened and interviewed people who "witnessed" the story. Questions can be asked in a biased fashion or can lead witnesses to state something that did not actually occur (how fast was the car going when it hit the tree vs. how fast was the car going when it smashed into the tree). The lineup pictures themselves can sway a person. If one picture is bigger or different it may be selected for those reasons only. Also, witnesses often feel like they HAVE to pick a picture even though the actual suspect may not be in the line up. Police may ask whether a person is "sure" if they are picking the wrong suspect and may have enthusiastic face gestures when the "right" one is picked. Conformity is another influence in eyewitness testimonies.
Human perception information is more advanced now and we now have a better understanding of slective decision-making processes, but there is still room to improve... especially in eyewitness testimonies.
Eyewitness testimonies is something we have all talked about in psychology. I want to know what is being done in the criminology field to help train officers not to be biased and to explain to juries that eyewitness testimonies should be taken with a grain of salt. I also think learning about more cases where eyewitness testimonies have failed or learning about statistics related to eyewitness testimonies would be beneficial.
The Cognitive Psychology textbook actually has a little section about the fallibility of memory and eyewitness identification. The section of the textbook repeats a lot of things that were mentioned in the Memory Observed book. The textbook mentions that personal memories are less than perfect. The section states that memories are not reconstructive (one consumes facts about the world then regurgitates them exactly as they were ingested), that they are in fact constructive (prior experience, postevent infomration, perceptual factors, and one's desire to remember influence memories). People can have false memories, which were reconstructed stoires about events that did not happen, they were invented. An example of this would be the journalist example (fake artcile, but people "witnessed and remembered" it).
I really liked this chapter. There is nothing I did not like, except I wish there were more examples. Eyewitness testimonies is something that has always interested me. I think it is really intriguing to learn that Hugo Munsterberg said eyewitness testimonies were not relaible so long ago, and people did not listen and still continued to take eyewitness testimonies to heart. The examples of how faulty our memory can be is interesting and scary at the same time. There are many memories in life that we are so sure about and many of those details may be fabricated because we could not remember exactally what happened. It is interesting because a person generally does not pay a lot of attention to their surroundings and that is what eyewitness testimonies are all about. From this chapter the fact about Hugo, the lineup stories, and just biased questioning in general is what I will remember. This chapter directly relates to cognitive psychology because it shows how the brain, perceptions, and memory can be unreliable or fill in gaps that we may not have actually witnessed. This chapter only relates to the AoM book through the broad fact that it deals with perception, attention, and memory.
Terms: Human perception, memory, repressed memories, false memories, reconstructive memories, constructive memories, eyewitness testimony and identification
For this assignment, I decided to start at the beginning of this book, mainly just to get a feel for what exactly this book was about. The first section of this book discusses some of the major questions that people may have about memory. It also discusses that, in the author’s opinion, the general questions that any curious individuals may have are not answered by most research dealing with memory. Part of the reason for this, according to Neisser, may be that “memory” in general does not exist. This is because there are so many forms and uses for memory that it is hard to specifically answer single, personal questions. Which kind of reminds me then of the chapters in AoM. AoM specifically dealt with personal questions that applied to specific cases, which in itself, is very interesting, but cannot be applied to general research as easily.
Some of the questions I have after reading the chapter kind of go along with what I disliked about the chapter. I thought some of the writing was a little harder to understand than other parts, which made it a bit more boring. Some of the terminology and wording was what made the comprehension difficult, specifically in chapter two. I understand that chapter two dealt with some other researchers refuting what Neisser originally wrote, but some of their main points were a little hard to understand.
Many different types of memory were mentioned in this chapter of Memory Observed, ranging from broad to specific. The textbook mainly talks about the broader forms of memory such as short-term memory and long-term memory.
Short-term memory (STM)is a storage system characterized by a duration estimated at about 12 seconds, by a capacity estimated at about 7 (+/-) 2 items, and by accurate recall. STM first processes the stimuli around us. It has very minimal storage capacity and limited processing capacity. In comparison, long-term memory (LTM) is a storage system that is characterized by its duration, capacity, and accessibility. It aids us in our ability to deal with the past and to use that information to understand the present (Solso, MacLin & MacLin, 2005, pp. 184).
Since my cognitive textbook did not talk too much about the specific types of memory brought up in this chapter I decided to see if any of my other psychology textbooks discussed them. I found the topic of repression in my abnormal psychology book. Repression is a defense mechanism whereby impulses and thoughts unacceptable to the ego are pushed into the unconscious (Davidson, Johnson, Kring & Neale, 2010, pp. 158). This is usually associated with dissociative disorders, which result in some aspects of cognition or experience being inaccessible consciously (pp. 157).
Overall, I thought this chapter was very interesting and gave quite a few good points about the study of memory. I particularly liked the question on education, and just how much students retain from their learning. I thought the author fit it in well with his main principle, “If X is an interesting or socially significant aspect of memory, then psychologists have hardly ever studied X” (pp. 4). This kind of reminded me of something discussed in my research methods class last year in regards to surveys. We talked internal consistency and reliability in terms of surveys, specifically split-half reliability. This deals with taking scores from the first half of the survey and correlating them with scores from the second half to check internal reliability. However, a problem that can result from this is that, with longer surveys, people tend to care less towards the end. I think the same concept can be applied to test-taking as well. Which then leads me to wonder why schools rely on scores, such as the GRE (which takes multiple hours to complete), when the problem with split-half reliability is something that researchers know exists.
I also found it amusing when Neisser writes about how the average third-grader knows most of the general research done on memory, which should be embarrassing for researchers to mention. Though this may be true, I personally still cannot help but find even the most general concepts to be quite amazing.
I also really liked how the author compares memory to other examples, in hopes that the reader will understand that understanding memory is not as simple as one might think, that in fact, it is rather complex. An example of this is on page eight when he compares the “cause of forgetting” to trying to establish the cause of crime. He also discusses that there are different opinions of what a “good” memory consists of. He describes that someone with a good memory may be those “unschooled individuals from traditional societies because they must rely on those memories so heavily where nothing can be written down” (pp. 15). Or someone else may believe that those same individuals have “poor memories because they lack the general mnemonic skills and strategies that come with literacy and schooling” (pp. 15).
Finally, one of his last quotations that I found to be insightful is about people with “unique” abilities. “Everybody who is skilled at anything necessarily has a good memory for whatever information that activity demands. … Every person is a prodigy to his neighbors, remembering so much that other people do not know” (pp. 16). I thought this was a very humble way of stating his (and everyone else’s) abilities.
After reading this chapter, I feel like I now have a better understanding of exactly how complex the process of memory is. The possibilities of studying this subject are endless.
Terms: reliability (split-half); short-term memory; long-term memory; repression
I chose to read the chapter “On Memory and Childhood Amnesia.” The chapter began by discussing different concepts related to memory. For instance, we are more likely to recall meaningful memories as opposed to memories that are really insignificant; there is no such thing as “impersonal memories.”
Next, childhood memories and adult memories are compared to autobiographical memories. Compared to autobiographical memories, we are much more likely to remember learned materials such as words, syllables and numbers because we use them on a regular basis. It seems we have amnesia of autobiographical memories between birth and approximately the ages of 5 or 6.
In adult memories we seem to remember “milestones” and “signposts.” Milestones refer to the passages of time, when an event occurs that’s typically not part of our normal daily lives. Signposts are considered to be more detailed or specific events that we experience at throughout our lives but not frequently. For example marriage or childbirth would be considered signposts. We only seem to remember these events because they’re simply stereotyped by society, not because they were significant experiences we encountered. Through childhood, adolescence and our adult years, we seem to remember, in general, the same experiences but only because society tells us too; this also includes our perceptions.
The adult memory is very poor at recalling childhood experiences; this is referred to as adult amnesia. Its been noted that childhood memories manifest through meaningful experiences, not because they are stereotypical. The author uses the term schematization. Visual and auditory memories fit into our schemata of experiences rather than the impressions alone; this is developed by our culture. Our real, true experiences are lost. Only those that fit our schemata, as defined by society are remembered.
Infants and children learn language from adults. It is said that the significant, meaningful experiences we have are lost when we try to use words to describe them: conventional schemata. The true meaning of our experience no longer exists. It is replaced by words we must adopt in order to communicate with people about our experience itself. With that said, this plays a significant role in childhood amnesia. Children and infants have not yet learned language and words. They have no way of communicating the experiences that they went through language. When they do begin to communicate them, at a time when their language skills are developed, the experience is no longer as meaningful as it once was.
Transschematic occurs when we approach adulthood. We forget parts and aspects of experiences that don’t fit into the defined patterns of language society has established. Early childhood amnesia is the most dramatic because there is no schema that society has developed.
The schemata of a culture depends on the rigidity and strictness of that specific culture. The more strict and conformed a culture is, the more schematized experiences have become. This is also found among various groups. For instance, in European culture women are much more likely to remember childhood memories. We tend to associate women, home and child rearing. We don’t typically see that interrelatedness with men. Therefore men are less likely to remember childhood experiences because of gender rolls society has established. Childhood amnesia is more present in men, compared to women.
I thoroughly enjoyed reading this chapter. The tone of the reading made it relatively easy to pick up on new terms and concepts; they were presented in a way that was easy to understand and interesting.
I will remember the fact that culture has an influence on what we remember. I found the analogy of signposts and milestones really interesting. I was also amused by the fact that infants are unable to communicate, so as time goes on and they begin to communicate, their experiences are lost. It is also interesting that the experiences we recall in adulthood are very different from what we actually experienced as a child. If we were able to travel back in time, we would see that what we recalled about the experience was actually far from what we experienced in the past.
Overall there wasn’t much that I disliked about the chapter. However I disagree somewhat on the contrasting of men and women’s childhood memory recall. It may be that men remember the same number of experiences in childhood, as women they just don’t voice them. This may in part be do to gender roles as mentioned.
The chapter relates to memory as we have discussed in class as well as the storage of memory. The terms explicit and implicit memories are also related to the reading because they both have to do with memory recall and our conscious. The text also states that the hippocampus is involved in our memory and learning of concepts. Like the chapter, the text also states that our long-term memory is very selective is choosing the information we remember; it disregards the information that we find insignificant.
The chapter definitely relates to chapters in the AoM that discuss memory and amnesia. However, the AoM describes more personal, anecdotal experiences where as the chapter I read focused more on terms and concepts related to child amnesia in general. They both agree that the more we rehearse information the greater the likelihood will we remember at a later date. They also both agree that we aren’t able to recall memories and experiences before the age of 4. Episodic memory is enable us to recall past experiences, as the chapter discussed. Semantic memory is the memory of words, syllables and such which is also described in the chapter.
After reading the chapter I went on to read other chapters in the section on memory in early childhood. I found them to be really interesting and I look forward to reading others.
Terms: autobiographical memory, visual, auditory, amnesia, schemata, long-term memory, episodic memory, semantic memory.
I chose to read the first section of our book. I did so because this is a new book and the beginning chapters provided a nice introduction for what we were getting into. There were many things from this first section of “Memory Observed” that were relevant to my text book. I chose a few, that I could relate to or was interested in, to discuss further.
Many times I have forgotten where I heard some piece of information. Knowing that can make a big difference- did I hear this on the news of from our four-year-old neighbor girl? Forgetting the source of a piece of information could be the result of error in either interpretation of integration. When it comes to interpretation it deals with inferences made during memory encoding based on activated schemas (organizes knowledge about related ideas) in long-term memory. When encoding the memory we may forget someone’s name because we had a schema that dealt with male pilots going through one’s mind when we were supposed to be encoding a memory for something that a female doctor said. The message would still be intact but the source for the message would not have been stored correctly. Maybe we could think of it like putting a piece of fruit in the canned soup isle- it most likely wont be retrieved.
When looking at integration we are combining features from different events and putting them into a unified representation during encoding. For this error we may have put two of the wrongs things together in order to complete the memory. I often have it where I think friend A has told me about her weekend when in fact it was friend B. I put the conversation with the wrong name, message, text, phone call etc. The communication is there - I know what happened during the weekend but I’m sure who told my that information!
My book looked at what information was easily remembered and for different lengths of time - particularly information that is learned during primary education years or elementary school. “Memory Observed” mentions that remembering a story is easier than recalling a list of words because a story in more meaningful, also increased study time and its positive effects, and lastly the savings that we have when we are relearning something.
A meaningful story is easily recalled because we will be able to relate to it. When selecting information we have to categorize it with previous information. A meaningful story will have more to relate to (previously stored information in the brain) and the memory will be stronger rather than the information being just a list of words.
It makes sense that we would recall things quicker if we are relearning them instead of learning them for the first time. We would have some prior knowledge or memory of such information. We may recall more than we thought we could - or we may find that the information that was previously stored was not quite accurate. Recalling information may be incorrect due to a recall error or due to a processing and encoding error. During initial processing we may be mislead by such things as false verbal memory or conjunction error.
A false verbal memory is when we hear the target word then a list of similar words following. We are mislead by the following list and there for remember the target word correctly. A conjunction error may occur when a word is remembered incorrectly due to similar sounding syllables mentioned previous to the word. So far we have been talking about mishearing a single word - not a big deal right? Well if that word is crucial to a sentence or the idea of a conversation then not remember that word can make a world of difference. For instance you recall all the words of someone’s statement except the target word. The sentences, “Today was great,” or, “Today was terrible,” are very different in meaning. But in memory you could recall either one based on the words that are said before and after this sentence. It’s a lot to think about. There are so many ways that we can recall information incorrectly!
This chapter was a good read. I found this less interesting than the case studies that we were reading earlier. However, this reading provides many more areas for further research for blogging. I will remember many things from this chapter. These authors, like most, are looking at things in ways I haven’t thought of before. For example, when we do not have a lot of research on a topic. It is not because that topic is magical or untouchable - it usually means that the topic is dull or boring in the eyes of researchers. Questions like what should we or what are we most likely to remember from childhood? How many great memories are we forgetting from childhood? On the other hand I was surprised that so many of our reading in psychology still branch from Freud’s original theories and those of the psychoanalytic ideas. Like the way that repressing a memory is really protecting the ego so that damaging memories do not creep into our consciousness. As I mentioned earlier the one that I did not like about this chapter was that it was a lot of summarizing studies and stating facts - or more specifically stating all the things we don’t know. One new thing that I learned about the brain is the growing list of ways or processes that our brain uses to store and recover and use information. It amazes me!
Lastly there many things in this chapter that relates to “Anthropology on Mars”. First of all this chapter deals with remembering childhood ideas. Dealing with childhood brings me to Franco while we continues to recreate his childhood home of Pantito. His memories are vivid and strong - to the point where it resembles images/memories that could be retrieved via seizure. Also when we are discussing remember or encoding things incorrectly that reminds me of the last Hippie where we could only remember is his music instructor’s name if we categorized in a schema that dealt with his passed. He couldn’t remember current information. It’s comforting to know that there are still a lot of unanswered questions. Even though that may mean that they are uninteresting questions…
Terms: Interpretation, Integration, Schemas, Selection, False Verbal Memory, Conjunction Error, Encoding, Recall, Processing.
I read chapter 23 from the Memory Observed book on children and reliable testimony. The research looked at a group of preschool children of various ages and their recollection of a meeting with a man called "Sam Stone". The children were briefly introduced to him while he visited the classroom during story time. After the visit some children were asked about some misdeeds he did (in reality he hadn't done these things), while another group was told about the misdeeds and told stories of Sam's clumsy personality. Another group was told about his personality and the misdeeds. The research purpose was to see if the childrens testimony of the visit could be altered though the suggestions that Sam was clumsy (stereotype personality) and the suggestions that he had soiled a teddy bear or torn a book (suggestibility of false memories). It's widely known that children are especially suceptible to influence when they are expected to give accurate testimony in court room settings. The influence of many adults, caregivers, social workers, and lawyers questioning the children and using what may seem like harmless probing questions may be more damaging to the truth of the story than we think. The researchers used probing questions such as "Did you see Sam throw the teddy bear?" and in the case of stereotype statements they said things like "Sam came to my house and I saw him drop my Barbie doll and break her". The research showed that the children in all three scenarios had a nearly 1/3 to 1/4 rate of false testimony to what had happened during Sams visit. With further probing the rates when down slightly but did not entirely extiguish. What was really interesting was the findings when they presented video footage of the childrens testimony to an group of unbiased adults. The adults had difficulty distinguishing between true and false statements from the children, and believed that the story of Sam Stome damaging a book and throwing a teddy bear were most likely true. The child that was accurate in her recall of the visit was the least likely to be believed.
This type of research is important for those who may be involved in any court case that involves children. A person on a jury may have very little idea of how easy it is to influence a childs memeory. If a child hears negative information about a person from those around them prior to giving a courtroom testimony it could negatively impact their view of the person in question. The opposite is also true that if a child hears that so-and-so couldnt have done this-or-that they may believe that they were wrong, and change their story. The same goes for probing questioning. If a child is asked if a person was wearing a red shirt many different times they may begin to believe that the person they saw was indeed wearing a red shirt.
After reading the book I wondered if it may be a certain type of childrens personality that makes them more suceptible to false memories. Perhaps those who are very imaginitive in their play may be easier to influence. How could it be possible to ensure a child is not influenced by those around them in such instances as court testimonies? Should we rely on childrens testimony? How much information about faulty memory is it standard to inform a jury on before listening to childrens testimony? Does reliability increase or decrease if there is more than one child being questioned?
The text book attributes the faulty memories many time due to our schemas, or expectations. If we assume a UNI student wears purple to football games and a fight breaks out after the game at a nearby bar if the victim says they were attacked by an overly passionate UNI student arguing about feild goals they may state they were wearing purple and gold when in fact they may have been wearing red or blue. We naturally assume that someone would give an accurate testimony unless they are deliberately lying. One thing we know is that facial recognition tends to not be as corruptible in our memory, but may be innaccurate for various other reasons. If we are paying attention to a weapon we may miss proper encoding of facial charecteristics. Add to this the problems of high stress situations or high emotions and the brain may only selectively encode what it finds to be most important, which may not be the face in front of us. Police line up research has found that up to 90% of people misidentify a perpetrator. If only one person has any similar features of the guilty party and the rest of the line up is dissimilar enough, a false identification is quite probable. There are also problems in cross race identification where a person of one race tends to have a harder time distiguishing between persons of a different race.
Another way to influence a persons perceptions of reality is through the wording of the questions asked. Such as with a car accident, if a person were asked how fast the cars were going when they hit, collided, or smashed into eachother. Each different way of wording the question can elicit a different response. This is called the misinformation effect. Implanted memories are false memories created through suggestion. This is where children are most seceptable. Many child psychologists and social workers beleive that children are less likely to be suceptable to implanted memories if the suggestions involve "personal bodily expedriences". This would include any sort fo physical or sexual abuse. However the text quotes research which shows that children could be implanted with memories of recieving a kiss from a parent during a bath. While this memory would be harmless to most children, we can see why these sort of memories being implanted may be problematic.
I think this research is really interesting. I read things in the past about the use of hypnosis to implant memories in adults, but always thought it took some wierd cult type brain washing to achieve memory impantation. When my siblings and I all get together and talk about childhood memories I assumed that the variations in our stories was more due to our various view points (there are six of us after all), but wonder if some of the stories may be influenced by repetitions of one persons view or if we may have filled in the blanks at times using schemas. I think our memory systems are fascinating, and will definately be reading further on this!
Transformations of Memory in Everyday Life - Marigold Linton
Chapter 11
Linton writes this chapter about memory, not so much in the style of reporting results from empirical studies but from personal introspection into her own memory function. She describes two types of long term memory: semantic and episodic. Both types of memory are very context dependent (what isn't) and provides evidence for what Dr. Maclin and many other psychologists claim: that the brain is LAZY! Semantic memory is our general memory of a type of situation. For example our semantic memory stores the information that tells us where everything is in our kitchen, what color the light is and the sound the dish washer makes when it kicks on. Episodic memory stores the events that happen to us within a semantic context. For example episodic memory stores what we had for dinner last night, how much beer we put in the fridge and whether or not we did the dishes. Linton theorizes that as we are exposed to a semantic context more and more our semantic coding of the situation becomes more effective and present and our episodic coding begins to decline in effectiveness. Essentially we become more familiar with the general information implied by the context we are in, you could say we form a more complete schema. But as our general semantic knowledge of a situation increases our ability to recall what happened at what point in history diminishes. We begin to get events and days mixed up.
The fact that our brain seems to stop storing new information to me implies that the brain is indeed a lazy organism. Once it is comfortable that it knows everything it needs to know to operate effectively it stops effectively storing new information and we have to consciously work harder to remember what happens when. Linton also suggests that our brains put much emphasis on novelty. We remember many of our firsts, our first time driving, our first kiss, our first joint. Perhaps these are so prominent in our memory because our brain began constructing a new semantic construct, or at least drastically altered an existing one. From then on our brain stored more information relevant to the event and began to store less information of the specific and unique kind. For example over time we learn and remember all the nuances and motor skills required for driving a car, but we don't recall anything at all about where or what we were driving March 28, 2008. Our brain stores what is relevant and then just kind of processes and then dismisses unimportant unique events.
Our book refers to a phenomena that is similar, primacy effects. Basically our brain most easily recalls the information that was presented to it first. Now this concept in the context the text book uses it in is based on being asked to recall a series of some kind all presented at the same time (testing short term memory). But it also seems to hold true for long term memory at least according the hypotheses of Marigold Linton. Primacy seems to rule, both in long term and in short term. I believe perhaps it is because the brain processes the first few items or instances in a series or in a lifetime more carefully than those later. The first items must be heavily analyzed to determine if there is a significant relationship between them. Once it is determined that there is indeed a relationship our brain immediately begins to process any new information as another piece to the puzzle.
terms
Semantic memory, episodic memory, primacy
For this blog I decided to read the chapter called Parental Recall of Child-Rearing Practices from our Memory Observed book. Basically, this chapter talks about how parents do not correctly recall their child-rearing ways. They over-estimate or underestimate when their child achieved certain milestones or other things, like how often they fed their babies. They also tried to see if there was any relationship between their false memories and “expert” opinions (i.e. Dr. Spock). Women tended to recall practices more like they were recommended than they actually happened. Both fathers and mothers were mistaken when they stated what age their children reached certain milestones, but fathers tended to be further off. It appears that their implicit memories win out in this case.
After reading this chapter I did have a couple of question. This study does not prove any causation and I wonder why these parents were so off, especially when they have such materials as baby books they probably could have been studying? The first thing that pops into my head is a stereotypical father not paying much attention to the sentimental details of their children and I doubt but wonder if that is the case here? Lastly, I wonder why some things (like toilet-training) the parents state as basically happening overnight when in reality it was a lengthy process and other times (like transition from bottle to cup) they over-exaggerate how long it took?
`The biggest thing I think is relevant when comparing this chapter to our text is implicit memory. Within the LTM there are different ways the memories are organized. One way is explicit or declarative memory. Explicit memory has subdivisions of episodic (which allows us to remember things that happened in our past) and semantic memories (memory of things such as words and concepts). Episodic and semantic memories also differ in other things such as rate of forgetting. Implicit non-declarative memory doesn’t require recalling things consciously. It includes such things as priming, classical and operant conditioning, and nonassociative learning.
Now back to the Memory Observed chapter. It was my first chapter from this book so I was a little surprised that it was actually a study. But I still enjoyed it. Being a mother of five I was really interested in what it had to say. I’m not sure what implications it has? Three things I will remember from this chapter is that by the time their children are three they will already not be able to accurately remember the way they reared their children. The second thing I will remember is that father’s typically were further off on when they thought milestones were reached than mothers. Lastly, I will remember that mother’s were persuaded more by what experts thought about child-rearing (feeding on demand vs. on schedule or thumb sucking vs. pacifier). I really like that the study wasn’t too stuffy or boring. It was pretty easy to follow. The one thing I really didn’t like about the chapter was that they really didn’t state what the significance of the study was. What I mean is how will this knowledge benefit us and what further studies should be done?
I didn’t know that parents are typically so off when recalling details of how they raised their children or when their children reached important milestones. This chapter made me think of how the brain can trick you. Memories you are certain of, or at least time frame, can be distorted even if you think it is crystal clear. Which also reminds me a little bit of some of the material in AoM. For instance the case where Greg didn’t know he were blind in the Last Hippie.
Terms: False Memories, Implicit Memories, Causation, LTM, Explicit/Declarative Memory, Episodic Memory, Semantic Memories, Implicit or Non-Declarative Memory, Consciously, Priming, Classical and Operant Conditioning, and Nonassociative Learning, Knowledge
The chapter that drew my attention was Chapter Six on Trauma: Real and Imagined. The reason why I was drawn to this chapter was because I feel it calls to the mind many issues that occur when victims/survivors are asked to recant their tales. The chapter opens up with memory of concentration camp survivors and discusses victim’s abilities to accurately recant information in regards to their abuses while in prisons/camps. What I found to be most interesting was the author’s point of view when reading the statistics. One example of this is when they point 17 out of 30 witness remembered their date of arrival in the camp. When I look at that stat I see that little more than half remembered the date. That doesn’t seem like a strong stat to be referring to; while the authors call it “remarkably accurate.” I feel like that shows an obvious point of view when the stat can be interpreted so subjectively. I found Handcuffed in History to Tony C. to be rather boring. And when I looked at a genuine recovered memory I found it to be questionable. It wasn’t until memory wars that I found that they were asking the same questions I had however to my disappointment they did not give adequate answers.
In the beginning of the paragraph it discusses whether or not it is possible for someone to forget and later recall memories of childhood trauma? Is it possible for individuals to create a false memories of childhood events? I found this to be the very exact question that I was asking myself. Yet they used spotty validation to say that both answers were correct. It stated that if we reread some of the chapters we would be able to see examples of both. Yet what I was looking for was the ability for ones sense of self and identity play a role in how we shape or memories.
What I am saying by making this statement is that we have an ability to shape our memories to fit into our sense of reality. When looking at the example of selection 33 we see that she didn’t remember her rape until it fit into her scope of herself. She saw herself as an abused victim therefore when the group leader pointed to the fact that abused victims are more often than not abused in their adult life, she remembered. I personally think we remember what works for us. And we choose to forget what doesn’t. In each selection I saw that people shape their memories to play into the roles that they had shaped for themselves. And it was because of this shaping and melding of the mind, thoughts, and memories we see the discrepancies in their testimony. Whether or not that is concentration victims not having accurate memories of who perpetrated crimes against them, or a rape victim not remembering that she was raped until it fit into her identity as an abused child.
Overall, I liked the chapter I found it to be rather interesting and thought provoking. What I did not like was the fact that it did not discuss the sense of identity and how it plays in shaping one’s ability to recall certain details of ones memories. I think what I will remember however are that often times we can forget events because we do not have retrieval cues. My book defines retrieval cues as a stimulus that helps a person recall or recognize stored information. The book also discusses reepsodic episodes. Where one relives the memory again and again actively participating in it, therefore they are capable of recanting memory. I think a lot of this is due to our own view of self. I think that often times we have self-projected retrieval cues. Where we define ourselves as say an abused victim, therefore we view our environment looking for things that will reassure that idea. That is where self-projected retrieval cues come in. We interpret our environment through our perception of the self. Hence when we look at things we apply memory to certain things. Going back to the sexually abused/rape victim. She could have been reminded of her rape on a daily basis. With as much as the news throws stories like that out there and the popularity of TV shows like Law and Order SVU. With that being said because nothing linked her sense of self to her memory she wasn’t able to recant it. It wasn’t until a self-projected retrieval cue was presented that she was able to recant this memory.
I found chapter 44, The Mind of a Mnemonist, extremely interesting. My interest was primarily peaked by the discussion involving a particular ability I am actually personally familiar with, remembering page numbers and extremely specific information on pages. Ulric Neisser described this and many other situation-specific memory talents frequently as abilities that tends to manifest and decline before completing adolescence. These traits and others that would compose an eidetic memory have always been of great interest to me.
Much of what I could find on the subject of eidetic memory had to do with just describing it in a complete manner. Many people possessing a “good memory” often like to think of it as an eidetic memory, but a complete eidetic memory is almost surely impossible. There are enough well-documented cases of people possessing a limited eidetic memory though, to make this it still a subject of great interest in cognition. Like many cognitive traits, limited eidetic recall is attributed to innate ability, learned mental processes, and large connected knowledge bases.
What I had read about limited eidetic recall reminded me of taking anatomy my senior year of high school, where my only conscious effort to learn material was to use a highlighter to mark important definitions or explanations as my teacher lectured. I would remember large sections of the text including page numbers, specific paragraph numbers for sentences, and the illustrations on those pages. What surprised me was that much of the time I was in class I was almost completely zoned out, doing everything on a sort of autopilot.
What really impressed me about what I had read in the text was the description of how this particular memory appears to an individual. Much of the time my memory is in such a fragmented state that even I come to expect many specific details as probably false, but eidetic recall is a different experience. The text described exactly how the experience had always been for me. This sort of recall never presented with any kind of delay of trying to remember, the need would simply arise and my mind would sort of blank and I simply “see” what I was trying to remember.
Reading about eidetic memory has only fueled the many questions I already had about it. I want to know why specific things are remembered so much more easily when they do not seem to touch on any personal, conscious level. Personally I believe much of memory relies on how you individually process information and using the parts that you can best conceptualize to better create associations.
It comes as a surprise that Bahrik, Hall and Berger actually studied memory for high school grades. But it is such a good idea. If you study it in college seniors, it has been a good many years since they were in high school and you get to test very-long-term memory genuinely. By the way, this is chapter 17: Accuracy and Distortion in memory for high school grades.
I have always put an enormous value on grades. This should not come as a surprise. I have been a student almost all of my life and being successful almost by definition is getting good grades. I would think I would remember my grades well from high school but I was curious to see what Bahrik, Hall and Berger found (by the way, Bahrik’s name is all over my textbook. He must be one of the key people in this field).
Just as a side note, I want to point out something that completely shocked me: A person who got an A in a class thought they got a D! And another did the opposite. They had a D and they reported an A! Isn’t it astonishing?
In general, higher grades were recalled more accurately and lower grades were recalled falsely. There was an overall inflation of grades, meaning that there was a tendency to think grades were higher than they actually were. Obviously, the original memory is being tinkered with. After all, the brain is self serving and it makes us feel better if we remember we got a grade better then the grade we actually received. However, this does not explain the one case I noted above where the student reported they got a D even if they actually got an A. That is not self serving.
The authors provide a very clever explanation for this. Sometimes the students did not actually remember what the grade was or they vaguely remembered what it was. In these conditions, they made a generalization about their grades. They might decide that they usually were a good student and received A’s and B’s in high school so the grade they could not remember must have been an A or B. The opposite is also true. If a person who did not do well in school did not remember a grade, they tended to report lower letter grades. And that was exactly what was happening with the student who got and A but reported a D.
I still find that explanation inadequate. It is sound; I understand how the inference works. But wouldn’t the inference come into play only when the memory of the grade is vague. A D student receiving an A is pretty unusual so how could they forget? It is difficult to wrap my brain around it, but then again, the brain does things that are just weird.
But definitely, that is one reason why this finding so unusual. It is generally agreed, (included in my text book) that events that are unusual stick out in our memory. Holidays tend to stand out so if we wanted to remember what we were doing at some time, we might search for a holiday or a major event that took place at around that time and then sort of think of what we were doing and self-prime.
It is an interesting finding. Surprisingly though, it does not give me any questions.
Terms: Prime, memory