Memory: Models and
Research Methods
Chapter 5
Outline
1. Tasks Used for Measuring Memory
2. Traditional Model of Memory
1. Sensory Store
2. Short-Term Store
3. Long-Term Store
3. Alternative Perspectives
4. Exceptional Memory and Deficits in
Memory
Basic Concepts
• Memory
– Is the means by which we retain and draw on
our past experiences to use this information in
the present
Basic Concepts
• Memory
– As a process, memory refers to the dynamic
mechanisms associated with retaining
common operations of memory:
• Encoding – you transform sensory data into a form
of mental representation
• Storage – you keep encoded information in
memory
• Retrieval – you pull out or use information stored in
memory
?
1. Tasks Used for Measuring Memory
Write down the name of the disorder.
Which of the following disorders it could be:
1. Prosopagnosia
2. Anosognosia
3. Autotopagnosia
1. Tasks Used for Measuring
Memory
Recall Versus Recognition Tasks
• Recall
– You have to reproduce a fact, a word, or other
item from memory
• Recognition
– You have to select or otherwise identify an
item as being one that you learned previously
– Recognition is usually much better than recall
1. Tasks Used for Measuring
Memory
1. Explicit-memory tasks
• You must consciously recall or recognize
particular information
1. Declarative-knowledge tasks
- you must recall facts
- What is your first name?
2. Recall tasks
- you must produce a fact, a word or other item from
memory
- Dysfunction of the basal ganglia is known to cause
-----------.
1. Tasks Used for Measuring
Memory
1. Explicit-memory tasks (cont.)
3. Serial-recall tasks
- you must repeat the items in a list in the exact order in
which you heard or read them
- If you were shown the digits 3-4-2-5-6, you would
be expected to repeat “3-4-2-5-6
4. Free-recall tasks
- you must repeat the items in a list n any order in which
you can recall them
- If you were presented with the digits 3-4-2-5-6, you
would receive full credit if you repeated “4-2-3-6-5”
1. Tasks Used for Measuring
Memory
1. Explicit-memory tasks (cont.)
5. Cued-recall task
- you must memorize a list of paired items; then when
you are given one item in the pair, you must recall
the pair for that item
- list of pairs: “book-pen, dog-table”; when given the
stimulus “book” you would be expected to say “pen”
6. Recognition tasks
- you must select or otherwise identify an item as
being one that you learned previously
- multiple choice test
1. Tasks Used for Measuring
Memory
-
2. Implicit memory tasks
You must draw on information in memory
without consciously realizing that you are
doing so
1. Tasks Used for Measuring
Memory
2. Implicit memory tasks (cont.)
1. Word completion tasks
- you are presented with a word fragment, such as the
first three letters of a word and you are asked to
complete the word
- e.g. BOO_
2. Task involving procedural memory
- you must remember learned skills and automatic
behaviors, rather than facts
- e.g. reading mirror writing, riding a bike
2. Traditional Model of Memory
1. Sensory Store
• Capable of storing relatively limited
amounts of information for very brief
periods
• Initial repository of much information that
eventually enters the short- and long-term
stores
2. Traditional Model of Memory
1. Sensory Store
• Iconic store
– Discrete visual sensory register, so called
because information is believed by some to
be stored in the form of icons (visual images)
– The iconic store can hold about 9 items and it
decays very rapidly (in terms of miliseconds)
?
Read the following list of numbers:
12, 45, 56, 89, 32, 21, 90, 48, 23, 98, 65, 45
?
Write down as many items from the list as
you can.
2. Traditional Model of Memory
2. Short-Term Store
• Holds memory for matters of seconds and,
occasionally, up to a couple of minutes
• George Miller (1956)
– Our immediate (short term) memory capacity for a
wide range of items appears to be about 7 items, plus
or minus two
• Chunking – organizing items into meaningful
units increases the capacity of short-term store
2. Traditional Model of Memory
3. Long-Term Store
• Store of memories that stay with us over long
periods, perhaps indefinitely
• Wilder Penfield
– Performed operations on the brains of conscious
patients afflicted with epilepsy
– used electrical stimulation of various parts of the
cerebral cortex to locate the origins of each patient’s
problem
– Patients sometimes would appear to recall memories
from way back in their childhoods that may not have
been called to mind for many years
3. Alternative Perspectives
1. Self-reference effect
– Very high levels of recall when we are asked to relate
words meaningfully to ourselves
– Each of us has a very elaborate self-schema, an
organized system of internal cues regarding
ourselves, our attributes, and our personal
experiences
– Therefore, we can richly and elaborately encode
information related to ourselves much more so than
information about other topics
3. Alternative Perspectives
2. Working memory
• Is part of long-term memory and also
comprises short-term memory
• It holds only the most recently activated
portion of long-term memory, and it moves
these activated elements into and out of
brief, temporary memory storage
3. Alternative Perspectives
3. Episodic versus Semantic memory
• Semantic memory
– General world knowledge – our memory for
facts that are not unique to us and that are not
recalled in any particular temporal context
• I remember the name of the researcher who
investigated the difference between semantic and
episodic memory.
• Episodic memory
– Personally experienced events and episodes
• I saw my friend Connie in the dentist’s office
yesterday.
4. Exceptional Memory and Deficits
in Memory
1. Outstanding Memory: Mnemonists
• Someone who demonstrates extraordinarily
keen memory ability, usually based on using a
special technique for memory enhancement
• Luria (1968) – mnemonist S.
– Could remember words 15 years after a session in
which he learned them
– S. had disorder called synesthesia which enabled him
to encode information efficiently
• Syntesthesia – Patient Experiences some sensations in a
sensory modality different from the sense that was physically
stimulated (e.g. colors are associated with sounds)
4. Exceptional Memory and Deficits
in Memory
2. Deficits in Memory: Amnesia
• Retrograde amnesia
– Individuals loose their purposeful memory for events
prior to whatever trauma induced memory loss
• Anterograde amnesia
– Difficulty remembering events that occurred from the
time of a brain trauma
• Infantile amnesia
– The inability to recall events that happened when we
were very young
4. Exceptional Memory and Deficits
in Memory
3. Memory and brain structures
• Double dissociation
– People with different kinds of neuropathologies show
opposite patterns of deficits
• Hippocampus
– Important in explicit memory
• Amygdala
– Important in encoding memories with emotional aspects
• Basal ganglia
– Primary structures controlling procedural knowledge
• Cerebellum
– Crucial in procedural memory
Synesthesia
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Synesthesia
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Synesthesia
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