Memory & Cognition
Sandeep Shekhar Nomula
391821
Cognitive Psychology
Winter Semester – 2014/15
Abstract
Memory is the means by which we draw on our past experiences in order to use this information in the present. Cognition is the set of all mental abilities and processes related to knowledge such as memory, language, perception, problem solving & decision making, reasoning, abstract thinking etc. The purpose of this paper is to understand how memory and cognition works and how it can help us in performing tasks successfully in our daily life.
The scientist found that the relation between memory for a consequential and emotional event and also for memory for the circumstances by which people learned about the
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With the help of this study we can know how the memory related problems in humans can be solved. And the cases of flash memories are interesting because flash memories concern memory for the source of news about that event. Also memories for the emotional events depend on different brain mechanisms than memories for the non-emotional …show more content…
The MTL/D patients will have difficulty in remembering new items while FL patients have no problem in it. Also, the source memory was not often correlated with neuropsychological measures of MTL/D function, but it was predicted by the measures of FL function. Two reports suggest that impairing of source memory by FL is not in the case of emotional situations. Patients with FL damage asked how they learned of the death of Princess Diana. (Kapur et al, 2000). These patients appeared to have normal flashbulb memories. But these memories were inconsistent with the FL damage impairing memory of source. When the same was asked to older adults, no relation was found between flashbulb memory and FL function (Davidson and Glisky, 2002). Healthy people, MTL/D patients and FL patients were tested about the tragedy of September 11. They answered about the target event (what happened on that day) and reception event (how they learned about it). When these patients were tested after six months to check their long term retention two hypotheses were observed. One is the memory for facts about the target event are impaired in MTL/D patients but not in FL
For the Memory measure section, the participants were given a questionnaire that were structured in the form of a cross-examination style questions. The study showed that when the participant frequently recalled the event both lead to an increase in accuracy and a likelihood of developing false memories. And avoidance of the event had lead to a decrease in memory. This research suggests that some PTSD symptoms can help memory recall and others can prevent it (Gittins, Paterson, and Sharpe, 2006, p. 25). PTSD is not proven to help memories, yet it is not proven to harm it.
Two groups of recovered memories Research showed that there are two types of recovered memory experiences (Shobe & Schooler, 2001). In the recovered in therapy type, the memories of abuse are recovered gradually, mostly in a therapeutic context. For instance, consider a case study of Ten Broeke & Merckelbach (1996) in which a woman named Ellen went to a hypnotherapist for having sleeping- and anxiety problems. After three 2-hour sessions with this hypnotherapist, Ellen recollected a memory about her father. She remembered laying on her bed with her father bending over her.
Unless future research and invention of accredited tools, to help on the true or false determination of the returned memories, are here there will not be an ease in mind of possibly wrong verdicts. The study has strengths and limitations as well. The amount of reported cases brings to the study many points of view and a lot of background information on the subjects. On the other
There are two types of long term memory declarative and procedural. Longterm declarative memory is stored in the hippocampus of the brain, any damage to this part of the brain would cause one the inability to form new memories. Procedure memories are stored in the cerebellum (Parts of Brain 2015) . Working memory and the ability to retrieve information is in the prefrontal cortex. Also in the prefrontal lobe, different parts than the working memory, is the semantic and episodic memory.
Our knowledge about how the human brain works is in debt to numerous unfortunate individuals. In the early 20th Century, they were considered medical miracles, but nevertheless some pitied them. By doing so, these people that were attempting to live normally were constantly reminded of their disability(ies) to a point of exhaustion. Henry Gustav Molaison, for example, is one of the most known patients in Neuroscience. Known by H.M. until his death, he was a “neuropsychological phenomenon” that helped discover significant advances in understanding the function of memory in the “hippocampus”.
The current study aims to “examine the phenomenological characteristics of positive flashbulb memories”
(2007) all underwent neuroradiological and neurophysiological exams to determine the presence of brain damage and confirm the form of amnesia they had. The results were consistent in that the case study with PA showed no brain damage while the OA case studies did show brain damage in the frontal lobes and hippocampus. Yet, only one PA case study is looked at while there are two OA cases in the Serra et al. (2007) paper, this isn’t a large sample. A problem encountered with finding case studies to compare is that individuals suffering from the amnesia being investigated can be rare and so finding larger samples is very difficult.
The third part of this was a another scan while they were asked from memory to remember the pairs. They were not able to remember many of the pairs. The results showed that the test subjects were able to consciously repress the memory of the second word of the pairs. Proving that the brain is able to repress memories. Based on my research and my own opinions, I was able to ascertain from many accounts that a suppressed memory is most likely to resurface when an incident happens that slightly resembles what occurred of felt in the repressed memory.
To start with the basis of understanding the memory, one must know that memories are stored in the hippocampus and prefrontal cortex. In a recent fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging) study over the past decade, researchers found that the hippocampus and prefrontal cortex have decreased in activity. The memory is a constructive surface and not so much reproductive. It can be distorted by being influenced by bias, association, imagination and peer pressure. As one goes to recall an event, the brain will now associate that memory with what is happening around them at the time of the recall.
FBs involve temporary, perhaps forgetful, memory loss for which aspects of experience are recalled via provision of pertinent cues. As a result, memory traces form but require facilitation to be accessed. Current research suggests that FBs is not the result of acute limbic system damage, but from retrieval based
The biological approach to the basis of memory is explained in terms of underlying biological factors such as the activity of the nervous system, genetic factors, biochemical and neurochemicals. In general terms memory is our ability to encode, store, retain and recall information and past experiences afterwards in the human brain. In biological terms, memory is the recreation of past experiences by simultaneous activation or firing of neurons. Some of the major biopsychological research questions on memory are what are the biological substrates of memory, where are memories stored in the brain, how are memories assessed during recall and what is the mechanism of forgetting. The two main reasons that gave rise to the interest in biological basis of memory are that researchers became aware of the fact that many memory deficits arise from injuries to the brain.
Alzheimer’s Effects on Memory Alzheimer’s disease is a progressive degenerative and ultimately fatal brain disease, in which cell to cell connections in the brain are lost. Alzheimer’s is the most common form of dementia, and is generally diagnosed in patients over the age of 65. The most commonly recognized symptom of Alzheimer’s disease is an inability to acquire new memories and difficulty in recalling recently observed facts, but it is by no means the only symptom. As the disease advances, symptoms include confusion, irritability and aggression, mood swings, language breakdown, long-term memory loss, and a gradual loss of bodily functions and death. Alzheimer’s does not affect all memory capacities equally: short-term memory (the ability to hold information in the mind in an active, readily-available state for a short period of time) is the first to go; next comes episodic memory (memory of autobiographical events); then the semantic memory
A similar study was carried out to test the flashbulb memory theory. In this study, the participants were undergraduates from either UK elsewhere but UK. The participants were asked about the resignation of the British Prim Minister Margaret Thatcher 1990. Participants were interviewed and asked about the event after a few days of the event had passed. They were reinterviewed 11 months later.
In conclusion I found the research quite fascinating. I believe that any type of experience if positive or negative has a profound impact in your life and will always subconsciously influence your decision making. But, that our life experiences influence our thought process in repressed memory situations that we can’t predict is beneficial consciously or unconsciously take repressed memory to a whole another realm. Cited references Sifferlin, A. (2014, March).
Struggling to remember if where you left your cell phone? Forgot to pick up an important note from the office? Has the meeting with your therapist that you booked a week ago completely forgotten? A frail memory can be totally disappointing in our daily life! Memory issues are a very normal annoyance, particularly with our age increasing yearly.