Psychology 001
Introduction to Psychology
Christopher Gade, PhD
Office: 621 Heafey
Office hours: F 3-6 and by apt.
Email: gadecj@gmail.com
Class WF 7:00-8:30 Heafey 650
In the last lecture we
learned about…
► How
memory was first
studied.
► Memory
testing
techniques.
► Different
types of
memories
 Temporal
 Content specific
Today, we’re going to discuss how our
memories can be erroneous at times.
►
Problems with our
memories
 Interference
 Serial order effects
 Reconstruction
effects
►
How to improve our
memories




Levels of processing
Encoding specificity
Learning intervals
Mnemonic devices
Let’s Test Our Memories
► We’ll
be going over
several lists of
words. Please
follow the
instructions and try
to the best you can
in each activity.
Problems with our memories…
► Interference:
a loss of memory accuracy
that is due to an overlap of information when
trying to recall specific details of
lists/events/people.
 Proactive interference: new material is lost (not
easily stored) due to old material.
►Flowers
►New
addresses (zip codes)
 Retroactive interference: old material is lost
(forgotten) due to new material.
►Fruits
►Specific
details about ex’s
Problems with our memories (cont.)
► Serial
order (position) effect: the better
retention of information/items due to their
position in a list of information/items.
 Primacy effect: the ability to remember
information at the beginning of a list more
easily.
►Word
lists 1 & 3 (primacy effect)
►Word list 2 (primacy effect removed)
 Recency effect: the ability to remember
information at the end of a list more easily.
►Word
lists 1 & 2 (recency effect)
►Word list 3 (recency effect removed)
Problems with our memories (cont.)
► Reconstruction
effect: our tendency to include
inaccurate information into our memories in an
attempt to “fill in the gaps”.
 Reconstructing stories and adding details
► Subway
video
► Word list 4
► Note: This happens a lot more than we think it does!
 Creating false memories versus uncovering of forgotten
memories
► Freud’s
work on repression
► Elizabeth Loftus research (in the text)
 Hindsight bias
► “I
remember thinking that today would not be my day.”
► “I never really liked him/her much anyway.”
► “I knew we shouldn’t have invested in that company.”
How do we improve our memories?
► Let’s
try
something
out…
Task 1
► In
this task, you’ll see a list of words,
remember how many of these words have
at least three vowels in them.
Task 1
► In
this task, you’ll see a list of words,
remember how many of these words rhyme
with the word stack.
Task 1
► In
this task, you’ll see a list of words,
remember how many of these words relate
to something that you valued from your
past.
Mouse
Shore
Flight
Shack
Sheet
Kayak
House
Attack
Assure
Unpack
Blouse
Smack
How to improve our memories (cont.)
► Levels
of processing: The deeper you think
about something, the more likely you are to
remember the information.
 More time spent on the information
 More retrieval cues are available
 More neural connections are formed
How to improve our memories (cont.)
► Encoding
specificity: we’re more likely to remember
information when we are in a condition that
resembles the condition that we were in when we
learned the information.
 Mood dependency
► Recollection
of traumatic events
 Situation dependency
► Baddelley’s
scuba diving experiment
 State dependency
► When
you’re using caffeine…
► When you’re using alcohol?
How to improve our memories (cont.)
►
Increased learning intervals
 Allows for deeper processing
 Counteract proactive and retroactive interference
 Allow for more encoding specificity opportunities
►
Mnemonic devices
 THE mnemonic device
► EGBDF
► OCEAN
 Chunking
► Phone
#’s
► List #1
 Information pairings
► List
#2
 Method of loci
► Grocery
Lists
So what have we learned?
► We
learned about how our memories can go
awry at times.
► We
also learned about a few methods that
we can use in order to improve our
memories.
► We
learned that studying memory can be
fun!!!