Types of Longterm Memory

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Types of Long-term Memory
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Explicit memory

• aka Declarative or Conscious memory
• Memory consciously recalled or declared
• Can use explicit memory to directly respond to a
  question
• Two subtypes of explicit memory

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Subtypes of Explicit Memory
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Episodic memory

• Memory tied to your own personal experiences
• Examples
• What month is your birthday?
• Do you like to eat caramel apples?
• Q Why are these explicit memories?
• A Because you can actively declare your answers
  to these questions

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Semantic memory

• Memory not tied to personal events
• General facts and definitions about the world
• Examples
• How many tires on a car?
• What is a cloud?
• What color is a banana?

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Semantic memory

• Q Why are these explicit memories?
• A Because you can actively declare your answers
• Important note Though you may have personal
  experience with these items, your ability to
  answer Qs does NOT depend on tying the item to
  your past
• i.e. Do not have to recall the time last week
  when you ate a banana to say that bananas are
  yellow

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Implicit memory

• Aka nondeclarative memory
• Influences your thoughts or behavior, but does
  not enter consciousness
• Three subtypes

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Subtypes of Implicit Memory
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Classical conditioning

• Pavlov
• Previously neutral stimulus now comes to elicit a
  response after pairing with an unconditioned
  stimulus

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Procedural memory

• Memory that enable you to perform specific
  learned skills or habitual responses
• Examples
• Riding a bike
• Using the shift stick while driving
• Tying your shoe laces
• Q Why are these procedural memories implicit?
• A Dont have to consciously remember the steps
  involved in these actions to perform them
• Try to explain to someone how to tie a shoelace

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Priming

• Pass out demonstration sheets

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Priming demonstration

• Unscramble the following word
• L T E P A

• Answer
• P E T A L
• P L A T E

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Priming

• Why did half the class say plate and the other
  half say petal?
• They were primed to do so
• There were two different sheets of unscrambled
  words

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Priming sheet 1

• Unscramble the following word
• F I N E K
• O P O N S
• K R O F
• P U C
• E C U S A R
• L T E P A

• Answer
• K N I F E
• S P O O N
• F O R K
• C U P
• S A U C E R
• P L A T E

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Priming sheet 2

• Unscramble the following word
• N Y P A S
• F E L A
• K T A L S
• D U B
• L O B S O M S
• L T E P A

• Answer
• P A N S Y
• L E A F
• S T A L K
• B U D
• B L O S S O M
• P E T A L

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Priming

• Do priming demonstration

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Priming
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Priming

• Activation of one or more existing memories by a
  stimulus
• Activation not a conscious decision
• BUT, can effect subsequent thoughts and actions
• Two types of priming

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Two types of priming
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Conceptual priming

• When priming stimulus influences your flow of
  thoughts
• Thought to involve activation of concepts stored
  in semantic memory
• Example Previous priming demonstration
• Example If you hear a story about a pitbull,
  when someone later asks you to name a dog, youre
  more likely to say pitbull

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Perceptual priming

• Can you identify the fragmented stimulus below?

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Perceptual priming

• What if you were shown the following slide
  earlier in the lecture?

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Perceptual priming

• Can you identify the fragmented stimulus to the
  right?

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Perceptual priming

• What if you were shown the following slide
  earlier in the lecture?

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Perceptual priming

• When a priming stimulus enhances ability to
  identify a test stimulus based on its physical
  features
• Priming is implicit because you dont need to
  consciously recall seeing the priming stimulus in
  order for priming to occur

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Evidence for separate implicit/explicit systems?

• Neurophysiological evidence
• Patient H.M.
• Life-threatening seizures originating in temporal
  lobe
• surgically removed portions of temporal lobe

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Temporal lobe

• Includes
• hippocampus
• amygdala

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Patient H.M.

• surgery was effective in reducing seizures
• BUT, had other side effects as well
• Can remember explicit memories acquired before
  the surgery
• e.g. old addresses, normal vocabulary
• Had difficulty forming NEW explicit memories
• e.g. remembering the name of someone he met 30
  minutes prior
• cannot name new world leaders or performers

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Hippocampal damage

• Deficits in forming new explicit memories

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Temporal lobe damage

• Monkeys and rodents with temporal lobe damage
  show similar patterns of deficits
• Impaired performance on a delayed-nonmatch-to-samp
  le task that tests explicit memory

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DNMTS task
Delay
Sample Phase
Choice Phase
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Temporal lobe damage

• Not impaired on similar task that taps
  habit-based (implicit) memory

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Habit-based task task
Trial One
Trial Two
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Patient H.M. Summary

• Temporal lobe damage led to deficits in explicit,
  but not implicit memory
• H.M. had both episodic and semantic memory
  deficits
• Damage to the hippocampus alone produces
  episodic, but not semantic memory deficits
• Why did H.M. show both types of explicit memory
  deficits?
• He had damage not only to hippocampus, but to
  other structures as well

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Are memories organized?

• Demonstration
• Recite the days of the week
• Recite the days of the week in alphabetical order
• Demonstrates that long-term memory is organized
• not just a random jumble of information
• How are memories organized?

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Demonstration

• List of words will be read one at a time
• Recall as many words as possible

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Demonstration

• Look at your sheet
• Is there a pattern to your answers?
• Most list several fruits, then vehicles, then
  furniture (or vice versa)

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How are memories organized?

• Hierarchical organization
• Associations

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Hierarchical organization

• Related items clustered together to form
  categories
• Related categories clustered to form higher-order
  categories
• Remember list items better if list presented in
  categories
• poorer recall if presented randomly
• Even if list items are random, people still
  organize info in some logical pattern

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Hierarchical organization
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How are memories organized?

• Hierarchical organization
• Associations

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Spreading activation model

• Mental links between concepts
• common properties provide basis for mental link
• Shorter path between two concepts stronger
  association in memory
• Activation of a concept starts decremental spread
  of activity to nearby concepts

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Spreading activation model