Short-Term Memory (STM)

Chapter 6 Part 2 - Memory Short-Term memory (STM): info is held for short time while being used ● Can be held for up to 30 seconds of longer by maintenance rehearsal Selective Attention: focus on only one sumptuous from all sensory input. Info centers into short term memory through this process ● Broadbent’s “bottleneck” effect that only important enough stimulus enters ● “Cocktail party effect” loud noises but can still recognize own name ● Dr. Treisman: 2 stage filtering process ● 1: incoming stimuli in sensory memory are filtered by simple physical characteristics. So the signal strength of unselected stimuli is less (attenuation) ● 2: only stimuli that reach threshold importance can proceed Magical #7 ± 2, George Miller: how much info can hold in short term memory at a time ● Memory test digitspan test series of number read and asked to repeat, gets longer ● Some people had really high spans or less, varies with person, age, and test ● Strategy: Can hold more if clumped “stacked” ex. Phone number by 3’s chunking ○ Combining info in STM into meaningful chunks Brown Problem: how to stop people from rehearsing is by blocking rehearsal ● Remember set of letters while also doing a hard task fast to block rehearsal ● Short 18 sec duration of lost STM if do nothing to keep it in memory Working memory: active system that processes info in short-term memory ● Short term: simple storage (how much, how long) ● Working memory: storage and manipulation of information (what’s happening) ● 3 parts: central executive (controls and coordinates other systems), visuospatial “sketchpad”, auditory action “recorder” or phonological loop ● Ex. Reading a book. Sketchpad contains the people and events images, recorder plays the dialogue in the person’s head, and centra interprets both together ● Ex. Desk. Pull files out (permanent memory), hand files (sensory input), see and work with the files (working memory) less important files thrown out while important ones are stored in permanent memory where they can be retrieved ● Helps study intelligence, learning, attention disorders and dementia Long term memory: info is kept more/less permanently, capacity & duration is infinite Rehearsal: repeat; not very effective Organization: adding meaningful structure; effective (chunking) Maintenance rehearsal/rote learning: rotating info in head to efficiently get into long-term Elaborate rehearsal: tying into existing knowledge; very effective ● Ex. Masion sounds like mason, and masons build houses (personal example) Procedural Memory: skills, habits, conditioned responses ● Ex. Remembering how to drive every time (reading, language) ● No “sense” of memory even when task itself clearly requires memory Nondeclarative memory: implicit type (skills, procedures, habits, conditioned responses) not conscious memories but are implied as they affect conscious behavior ● ● ● ● Ex. Tie shoes and riding bicycle (cerebellum) Ex. Amygdala emotional associations (fear) “Never forget” memories, Alzheimer’s disease patients still have this Not easily retrieved into conscious awareness (can’t explain how to tie shoes without showing it with your hands) Anterograde amnesia: loss of memory from injury/traumatic trauma, inability to form new long term memories (damage to hippocampus) ● Study: disorder patients played tower of hanoi easily but didn’t even remember playing or seeing it later on. The memory of solving it are in diff part of brain from forming memories Declarative memory: explicit, info that is conscious and known (facts) can be forgotten but always have potential to be made conscious ● Semantic: general knowledge of language and info in formal education. Meaning of words, concepts, math. Ex, final exams (NO time tag) ● Episodic: personal information not readily available to others. Daily activities and events in one own life. More meaningful like FDOC and first date but not remember every detail of everyday. Women have better (Time-tagged) Semantic network model: info is stored in brain and connected by related concepts stored physically close to each other than non-related concepts (distinguish if bird)