psychologists use the metaphor that the mind is an information … · 2019. 1. 5. · lp 6f...

LP 6F imperfect memories 1 01/05/19

Memory as Information Processing

Psychologists use the metaphor that the mind is an information processor that

• encodes,

• stores and

• retrieves information. A rough analogy is that memory is like computer processes.

Reasons why we forget can be due to problems in encoding, storage or retrieval


Memory as Information Processing The analogy doesn’t capture other features of memory such as that people forget and distort information and sometimes remember events in a way that is different than how the event actually occurred. Memory is NOT like a video tape that records everything. It is more like a jigsaw puzzle where we remember certain events and reconstruct the missing pieces.


What memories are real?

It is very difficult to distinguish between “actual memories” and reconstructed memories. Reconstructed memories are potentially inaccurate. A student example:

In middle school I was asked to write a paper on the earliest memory I could recall. I whacked my brain for hours trying to remember something from my early childhood, when suddenly it came to me: I was running along the coast on a very cold and drizzly day, wearing an aqua green quilted jacket, and I could see my long hair escaping on both sides of the hood, flying in the wind.


Reconstructed Memories


Imperfect Memories

• Misinformation effect

• Schemas and Memory Distortions

• Source Confusion

• Imagination Inflation


Misinformation Effect Misinformation effect: A memory-distortion phenomenon in which your existing memories can be altered if you are exposed to misleading information (page 229). In one experiment by Elizabeth Loftus, she showed an accident involving two cars. To find out if the language used to question witnesses had an effect on memory, she asked different groups of people to estimate the speed of the cars using different questions.

In our semantic networks, a faster speed is linked to smashed rather than contacted.


Misinformation Effect

A week later, she asked the participants “Was there any glass?” Those who were asked

• the “smashed into” version, 32% reported seeing glass

• the “contacted” version, 14% reported seeing glass There was no glass. People mentally reconstructed and inferred the presence of glass by the language used. How you ask a question to elicit information has an effect on how you remember the event and answer the question. Small changes in language affect memory. Also see leading questions and schemas. We can be influenced without our knowledge.


Schemas and Memory Distortions In this demonstration, participants were asked to wait in this office for the study on memory to begin.

Afterwards, they were brought to another room and asked to recall as many objects as they could remember in the office they were waiting in.


Schemas and Memory Distortions What participants recalled about the office: Correct recollections by participants:

• Chair

• Bookcase

• Desk

• Typewriter

Items typically

Incorrect recollections by participants:

• Books

• Telephone

• Filing cabinets

• Pens and pencils

• Coffee cups

found in an office

Items not recalled by participants:

• Coffee pot

• Wine bottle

• Picnic basket

Items typically not found in an office


Schemas and Memory Distortions How do psychologists explain these errors in memory recall?

Most people do not pay attention to the details and encode the content of the office because it is not very important for their daily life. A majority of the contents of office entered sensory memory, but was not encoded (encoding failure) into short-term memory and quickly forgotten. To reconstruct what was in the office, participants activated a schema of an office. To help “remember” the contents of the office, people activated an “office schema” and inferred items that are typically in an office. This means:

• Remembering things that are typically in an office (regardless if they were in there or not).

• Not remembering and forgetting things that were in the office but not in a “typical office”.

A schema is an organized cluster of information about a particular topic (page 230).


Schemas and Memory Distortions

• Information consistent with an office schema would include telephone, books, lamp, etc.

• Information inconsistent with an “office schema” would include candles, cars, submarines, etc.

You can generalize how schemas affect memory by the following:

• We tend to remember things that are consistent with a schema.

• We tend to forget things that are inconsistent with our schema.


Perceptual Sets and Beliefs can Affect your Memory In the following demonstration people looked at this picture and later asked to recall what went on in the picture. What do you see in this picture?

What do you remember about this picture?


Stereotypes and Memory Like schemas, your beliefs can make you forget things that inconsistent with your beliefs and remember things that are consistent with that belief—regardless of the reality. This experiment was done when stereotypes of black people were quite negative (e.g. people had a stereotype that black people are more likely to rob a person). With this stereotype, people remembered the following that were not true:

• The black man was more aggressive.

• The white person was more passive.

• The passengers were afraid.

• The razor was in the black man’s hand. Schemas and stereotypes can have an affect on memory, and has the potential to affect our behavior, attitudes, or decisions, by not giving blacks the benefit of doubt or opportunities. If you have a negative stereotype of minorities, members of groups you consider “outcast” or deviant, you are more likely to interpret behavior as being criminal and notice more “criminal behavior” in minorities and ignore “criminal behavior” in non-minorities.


Schemas and Memory In the following example, a schema helps organize the seemingly random and obscure statements. Instructions: Take a minute to read through this paragraph. After a minute, try to recall as much information about the paragraph as you can. Do the best you can, exact word for word recall is not required as long as it is close.

The procedure is actually quite simple. First arrange things into different groups. Of course, one pile may be sufficient depending on how much there is to do. If you have to go somewhere else due to lack of facilities that is the next step, otherwise you are pretty well set. It is important not to overdo things. That is, it is better to do too few things at once than too many. In the short run this may not seem important but complications can easily arise. A mistake can be expensive as well. At first, the whole procedure will seem complicated. Soon, however, it will become just another facet of life. It is difficult to foresee any end of the necessity for this task in the immediate future, but then one never can tell. After the procedure is completed one arranges the materials into different groups again. They can be put into their appropriate places. Eventually they will be used once more and the whole cycle will eventually have to be repeated. However, that is part of life.


Schemas and Memory Distortions In this example, activating the schema of sleep, hindered memory, and generated a memory of something that wasn’t present, but logically should be there. This process occurs unconsciously and automatically. Since it occurs unconsciously and automatically, they are hard to prevent and control. This also means we make judgments and decisions on processes we may or may not be aware of.


Rest

Cozy

Slumber Yawn

Comfort

Bed Wake

Night

Awake

Tired

Snore

Sound

Dream


Sweet and needle are the targets


Schemas and Conservation (Piaget)

People have a difficult time believing that 3rd world countries have an easier time overcoming the conservation problem than Americans.

Psychological Science, Fifth Edition Copyright © 2015 W. W. Norton & Company


Schemas, Memory and Expertise

Expert coaches had better memory for logical plays and expert chess players had better memory for chess pieces in a real game suggesting a previous framework (schemas) facilitated memory. However when expert coaches saw illogical plays and expert chess players say random pieces in a real game, their memory was no better than novices.


What are examples where labels (which activate schemas) affect what we remember and think?

A schema is an organized cluster of information about a particular topic. Schemas can affect social perception, especially in race relations. The

language and labels you use activate certain schemas and affect your perception of political, social and personal issues?

Choosing the language and hence the schema can frame an issue. It influences how a person perceives the event, what they see, and remember about the event, regardless of the reality. If you can control the framing of an issue, you can affect public perception of that issue.

Without context and background information (which is often not provided or known) or you know very little about the topic, it is difficult to assess the appropriateness of the labels and schemas that are provided.


Schemas and Attitudes The activation of different schemas can lead to different responses. This is why controlling the message is important.


Problems with casually testing beliefs and Memory The following are tricks that can mislead you. It is easier to notice the following “tricks” because

(a) I am instructing you to look for the “trick”. (b) These examples are written and you can see and read them compared

to only hearing them. (c) These apparent discrepancies are occurring close together in time.

The following are statements lead the reader to infer something that isn’t what the empirical evidence uncovers.

• No battery outlasts Eveready

• No battery outlasts Energizer

• No battery outlasts Duracell


If you don’t know how you are being misled, you will take the wrong corrective measures and allow the deception to continue and continue in different forms.

• no other pain reliever is more effective than Bayer

• no other pain reliever is more effective than Excedrin

• no one beats our prices The following misleads you in a different way that the previous three examples.

• A survey in a major medical journal says that 8 of 10 people take a supplement to live a longer life


Source Confusion and Memory misattribution Source confusion and memory misattributions are one of the primary causes of eyewitness misidentifications. Eyewitnesses can identify people based on familiarity. They recognize that they have seen the person before, but can’t remember the source of that recognition (when, where or the context of the information). Since they are being asked about the crime and the person seems familiar, eyewitnesses can unconsciously infer that that was the person. Eyewitness testimony tends to be persuasive because people exude confidence in what they saw. In chapter 12, Social Psychology, this can be especially troubling when members of an out-group tend to look the same (out-group homogeneity effect).

Is what we remember something we saw on TV?

OR

Is what we remember an actual experience?


Source Confusion In the 1970s, one of these men was misidentified as “the Gentleman Bandit”.

Eyewitness confidently identified “the Gentleman Bandit” (he was dubbed the Gentleman Bandit because he was so nice when he robbed them). However, it appears that the reason they were confident was that they were familiar with the suspect’s face because his picture was shown on the evening news. This memory was confused with the actual memory.

Is what we remember a picture we saw on TV?

OR Is what we remember an actual experience of being robbed?


Source Confusion Mistaken for a terrorist: Homeland Star only plays one on TV.


Amnesia

Type of amnesia Definition Retrograde

A condition in which people lose past memories, such as memories for events, facts, people or even personal information (page 291). Backward-acting memory loss; especially for episodic memory. It is believed that the process of memory consolidation is impaired with severe blows to the head.

• Trevor Reese Jones (Princess Diana’s bodyguard) has retrograde amnesia.

Anterograde

A condition in which people lose the ability to form new memories (page 291); forward acting memory loss.

• H.M. could not form new explicit memories (episodic and semantic), but could learn and form new procedural memories.


Retrograde Amnesia Retrograde amnesia: Loss of memory, especially for episodic information; backward-acting amnesia (page 240).

Past Onset of

amnesia

Present Future

e.g. an accident What occurred a few moments before the accident

The accident

Later memories are intact


Anterograde Amnesia Anterograde Amnesia: Loss of memory caused by the inability to store new memories; forward-acting interference (page 240).

Past Onset of

amnesia

Present

Future

Has long term memories

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psychologists use the metaphor that the mind is an information … · 2019. 1. 5. · lp 6f...

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