Unit VII Module 33.pdf, Study notes of Construction

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Unit VII:

Cognition

Module 33 Forgetting, Memory Construction & Memory Improvement

Encoding Failure

We cannot remember what we do not encode.

Storage Decay

• Poor durability of stored memories leads to their decay.
• Ebbinghaus’ research:

Amnesia

• Anterograde amnesia – can recall the past, but cannot form new memories
• Some people with anterograde amnesia can form new implicit memories (how to do something), but will have no conscious recall of learning the new skill
• Retrograde amnesia – cannot recall the past (memories stored in long-term memory)

Memory Construction

• Memory is not precise: we infer our past from stored information plus what we imagined later, expected, saw, and heard
• Information acquired after an event alters memory of the event; we often construct memories as we encode them and every time we “replay” them

Misinformation

Elizabeth Loftus’s research: Group A: How fast were the cars going when they hit each other? Group B: How fast were the cars going when they smashed into each other?

Memory Construction

14 32 0 10 20 30 40 50 Group A (hit) Group B (Smashed into) Verb Broken Glass? (%) A week later they were asked: Was there any broken glass? Group B ( smashed into) reported more broken glass than Group A ( hit ).

Eyewitness Testimony

• Memory construction helps explain why 79% of 200 convicts exonerated later by DNA testing had been misjudged based on faulty eyewitness testimony

Consensus on Childhood Abuse

1. Injustice happens.
2. Incest and other sexual abuse happens.
3. People may forget.
4. Recovered memories are commonplace.
5. Recovered memories under hypnosis or drugs are unreliable.
6. Memories of things happening before 3 years of age are unreliable.
7. Memories, whether real or false, can be emotionally upsetting. Leading psychological associations of the world agree on the following concerning childhood sexual abuse: p. 351 - 352

• Forgetting 33 -
• Interference 33 -
• Memory Construction Errors 33 -
• Children’s Eyewitness Recall 33 -
• Improving Memory 33 -