Spotlight on Terminology and Language – ESL
Pointers
To do something thoroughly is to do it
completely.
Module 19: Recalling Long-Term Memories
Page 231 “Stammering, he desperately searched
his memory, but to no avail. ‘I know her name,’ he
thought to himself, ‘but here I am, looking like a
fool. I can kiss this job good-bye.’”
Stammering means speaking with difficulty –
stopping and starting words incompletely.
When we “kiss this job good-bye” we quit or
leave the job.
Page 231 “Many psychologists have suggested
that the material that makes its way to long-term
memory is relatively permanent (Tulving &
Psotka, 1971).”
Permanent is something that continues and
endures (as in the same state, status, or place)
without much change. You think of something
permanent as fixed. Can you describe some of
your permanent memories?
Page 231 “For instance, if you are like the average
college or university student, your vocabulary
includes some 50,000 words, you know hundreds
of mathematical “facts,” and you are able to
conjure up images – such as the way your
childhood home looked – with no trouble at all.”
To conjure up is to call up or invoke an image.
You can conjure up many images.
Page 231 “For example, the smell of roasting
turkey may evoke memories of Thanksgiving or
family gatherings.”
When you evoke a memory, you call it up. You
are summoning or eliciting this material.
Page 232 “It suggests that the amount of
information processing that occurs when material
is initially encountered is central in determining
how much of the information is ultimately
remembered.”
Things that central to something are the most
important aspect or feature of it.
Page 232 “However, information to which we pay
greater attention is processed more thoroughly.”
Page 232 “At shallow levels, information is
processed merely in terms of its physical and
sensory aspects.”
Shallow is having little depth; penetrating
very lightly.
Page 232 “Those letters are considered in the
context of words, and specific phonetic
sounds may be attached to the letters.”
When you consider items in context, you are
examining the whole picture. You are looking
at the interrelated conditions in which
something exists or occurs.
Phonetic sounds represent the sounds and
other phenomena, such as stress and pitch, of
speech.
Page 233 “Rote memorization of a list of key
terms for a test is unlikely to produce longterm recollection of information, because
processing occurs at a shallow level.”
Rote memorization is automatic repetition of
whatever it is that is trying to be placed in
memory.
Page 233 “Surgeons may be chatting with
nurses about a new restaurant as soon as they
sew you up.”
When doctors’ close up a patients wound it is
said that they are “sewing you up.”
Page 233 “However, it is very possible that
although you had no conscious memories of
the discussions on the merits of the restaurant,
on some level, you probably did recall at least
some information.”
Merits are the value or benefits provided by
something.
Page 233 “In fact, careful studies have found
that people who are anesthetized during
surgery can sometimes recall snippets of
conversations they heard during surgery—
even though they have no conscious recollection
of the information.”
A snippet is a part of something that is incomplete
by itself.
Page 233 “Even though people may say and even
believe they harbor no prejudice, assessment of
their implicit memories may reveal that they have
negative associations about members of minority
groups.”
When you harbor something you keep it in mind
or believe it.
Page 234 “You promptly forget the name of the
moon, at least consciously.”
To do something promptly is to do it
immediately, or right a way.
Page 234 “Then, several months later, you’re
completing a crossword puzzle that you have
partially filled in, and it includes the letters obos.”
A crossword puzzle is a word problem where
letters are placed in a grid according to clues, so
that they form words from left to right and up to
down on the grid.
Page 234 “You will most likely draw a blank
until this piece of information is added: January
12, 2010, was the date of the catastrophic
earthquake in Haiti.”
When people “draw a blank” they cannot
remember something.
Page 234 “Flashbulb memories illustrate a more
general phenomenon about memory: Memories
that are exceptional are more easily retrieved
(although not necessarily accurately) than are
those relating to events that are commonplace.”
Things that are exceptional are unusual and stand
out.
Things that are commonplace are usual or
ordinary.
Page 235 “As we have seen, although it is clear
that we can have detailed recollections of
significant and distinctive events, it is difficult to
gauge the accuracy of such memories.”
To gauge something is to measure it.
Page 235 “He suggested that people tend to
remember information in terms of schemas,
organized bodies of information stored in
memory that bias the way new information is
interpreted, stored, and recalled (Bartlett,
1932).”
To bias something is to be unfair or prejudice
in your decisions.
Page 236 “One of the earliest demonstrations
of schemas came from a classic study that
involved a procedure similar to the children’s
game of ‘telephone’, in which information
from memory is passed sequentially from one
person to another.”
The game of telephone is a game in which a
message is passed from one person to another
in a whisper. The object is to see if the
message started by the first person is the same
message that the last person hears—usually
the message changes as it gets passed from
one person to the next.
A sequence is one event following another in
some order; sequentially means how this is
done.
Page 236 “The transformation of the white
person’s razor into an African American’s
knife clearly indicates that the participants
held a schema that included the unwarranted
prejudice that African Americans are more
violent than Caucasians and thus more apt to
be holding a knife.”
Things that are unwarranted are not justified
or deserved.
Page 236 “Both were ultimately exonerated
on the basis of DNA evidence.””
To be exonerated is to be found innocent of
any wrongdoing.
Page 236 “When a criminal perpetrator
displays a gun or knife, it acts like a
perceptual magnet, attracting the eyes of the
witnesses.”
A magnet is something, usually a piece of metal,
which attracts things to it.
Page 237 “Some were then asked the question,
‘About how fast were the cars going when they
smashed into each other?’”
To smash something is to hit it very hard, so that
it breaks into pieces.
Page 237 “Children’s memories are especially
susceptible to influence when the situation is
highly emotional or stressful.”
When someone is susceptible they are vulnerable
or at risk.
Page 237 “For example, in trials in which there is
significant pretrial publicity or in which alleged
victims are questioned repeatedly, often by
untrained interviewers, the memories of the
alleged victims may be influenced by the types of
questions they are asked (Scullin, Kanaya, & Ceci,
2002; Lamb & Garretson, 2003; Quas, Malloy, &
Melinder, 2007; Goodman & Quas, 2008). ).”
Alleged means suspected of wrongdoing, but there
is not yet proof.
Page 237 “The entire case was based on memories
of Franklin’s daughter, who claimed that she had
repressed them until she began to have
flashbacks of the event two decades later.”
To repress a memory is to block it out.
A flashback is a very vivid and detailed memory
of a painful event that happened in the person’s
past.
Page 238 “On the basis of her memories, her
father was convicted—and later cleared of the
crime after an appeal of the conviction.”
An appeal is formal request for the court system
to rethink another court’s decision.
Page 238 “Supporters of the notion of repressed
memory (based on Freud’s psychoanalytic theory)
suggest that such memories may remain hidden,
possibly throughout a person’s lifetime, unless
they are triggered by some current circumstance,
such as the probing that occurs during
psychological therapy.”
When we probe something we do a complete
investigation into it.
Page 238 “However, memory researcher
Elizabeth Loftus maintains that so-called
repressed memories may well be inaccurate or
even wholly false—representing false
memory.”
Wholly means completely.
Page 238“For example, we tend to forget
information about our past that is
incompatible with the way in which we
currently see ourselves.”
Something that is incompatible is mismatched
or conflicting.
Page 238 “One study found that adults who
were well adjusted but who had been treated
for emotional problems during the early years
of their lives tended to forget important but
troubling childhood events, such as being in
foster care.”
Foster care is a system in Canada in which
children whose parents cannot provide care for
them are placed with other families.
Page 238 “For example, although 61 percent
of the questionnaire respondents said that
playing sports and other physical activities
was their favorite pastime, only 23 percent of
the adults recalled it accurately (Offer et al.,
2000).”
A pastime is a hobby or pleasurable activity.
Page 239 “Travelers who have visited areas of
the world in which there is no written
language often have returned with tales of
people with phenomenal memories.”
Something that is phenomenal is very unique
or extra special.
Page 239 “For instance, storytellers in some
preliterate cultures can recount long
chronicles that recall the names and activities
of people over many generations.”
A preliterate culture is one that does not use the
written word.
Recount means to tell a story.
Chronicles are a type of story that relates the
history of a particular group of people.
Page 239 “Those feats led experts to argue initially
that people in preliterate societies develop a
different, and perhaps better, type of memory than
do those in cultures that employ a written
language.”
Feats are notable achievements.
Page 239 “Basic memory processes such as shortterm memory capacity and the structure of longterm memory—the “hardware” of memory—are
universal and operate similarly in people in all
cultures.”
Hardware refers to the tools and equipment that
make up a computer.
Page 240 “From a social worker’s perspective:
Should a child victim of sexual abuse be allowed
to testify in court, based on what you’ve learned
about children’s memories under stress?”
To testify means to tell a story and/or answer
questions under oath in a legal proceeding.