Chapter 6: Long-Term Memory: Structure

Theme: Division and Interaction

1. Division — distinguishing between different types of memory.
2. Long-term: Episodic, Semantic, Procedural.
3. Interaction — different types of memory can interact and share mechanisms.

LTM Vs. STM/WM

LTM interacts with working memory, the interplay between what is happening in the
present and information from the past is a distinction between LTM and STM/WM.
1. B.B Murdock Jr. 1962 — Serial Position Curve.
1. The Serial Position Curve — plots percentage of a group of participants that
recalled each word versus its position in the list.
2. Primacy effect (rehearsal) and Recency Effect (STM).

Coding in STM and LTM

Coding refers to the form in which stimuli are represented.
1. Visual coding — STM = patterns / LTM = faces.
2. Auditory coding — Phonological similarity effect (confusing F with S) (STM).
Song in head = LTM.
3. Semantic coding STM— Proactive interference (the decrease in memory that occurs
when previously learned information interferes with learning new information).
Release from proactive interference.
4. Semantic coding LTM — The Sachs Experiment tests recognition memory, do u
remember the actual wording or general meaning?

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 Locating Memory in the Brain
1. Prefrontal Cortex —> Working Memory.
2. Hippocampus —> Long-Term Memories.
3. Parietal Lobe —> Short-Term Memory.

EXAMPLE 1: HM/Henry Molaison (1953)

Surgery for epileptic seizures —> removal of hippocampus on both sides of the brain —>
eliminating ability to form new long-term memories.
EXAMPLE 2: KF
Motorbike accident —> damage to parietal lobe —> reduced digit span, instead of an
average of 5-9 digits, KF only remembered 2. Recency effect was also reduced.
The two examples are proof that STM and LTM are caused by different mechanisms, this
is known as double dissociation.

Can the hippocampus also play a role in holding information for short periods of
time?
The hippocampus and other medial temporal lobes structures once thought to be involved
only in LTM also play some role in STM.

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 Episodic and Semantic Memory (LTM)
Endel Tulving (1985), who first proposed that episodic and semantic memories handled
different types of information, also suggested that episodic and semantic memory can be
distinguished based on the type of experience associated with each.
1. Differences in Experience
Defining property of Episodic Memory is that it involves mental time travel — the experience of
traveling back in time to reconnect with events that happened in the past. Synonyms: reliving, self-
knowing, or remembering.
Semantic memory involves accessing knowledge about the world that does not have to be tied to
remembering a personal experience.
2. Neuropsychological Evidence
The case of KC suffered severe damage to his hippocampus and surrounding structures, he lost his
episodic memory, he couldn’t relive any events of his past. But he remembers facts, his brother died
2 years ago, but can’t remember any personal experiences.
The case of LP, Italian woman, suffered an attack of encephalitis at 44. She lost semantic memories,
who is Beethoven? But remembered events in her life.
KC and LP = double dissociation.
3. Brain Imaging

Keda we finished division w hankhosh 3ala interaction.

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Interactions Between Episodic and Semantic Memory
1. Knowledge affects experience. Semantic memory guides our experience, and as
such, influences the episodic memories that follow from experience.
2. The makeup of autobiographical memory. Interplay between episodic and semantic
memory/components. Personal semantic memories are facts associated with
personal experiences.

What happens to episodic and semantic memories as time passes?

1. Familiarity — the person seems familiar, might remember their name, can’t remember
any details about specific experiences involving that person. (Semantic)
2. Recollection — remembering specific experiences involving that person. (Episodic)
3. Semanticization of remote memories — loss of episodic detail for memories of
long-ago events.

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 Episodic and Semantic Memory (LTM)
Shakespeare — What’s past is prologue.
Extending the dots into the future has become an important topic of memory research.
This research doesn’t ask how well we can predict the future, but asks how well we can
create possible scenarios about the future. The reason this has become a topic of research
is that there is evidence of a connection between the ability to remember the past and the
ability to imagine the future (personally). Evidence for this connection is provided by
patients who have lost their episodic memory as a result of brain damage.

All brain regions that were active while thinking about the past were also active while thinking about
the future. This suggests that similar neural mechanisms are involved in remembering the past and
predicting the future.
Constructive Episodic Simulation Hypothesis states that episodic memories are extracted and
recombined to construct simulations of future events.

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 Procedural Memory, Priming, and Conditioning
1. Procedural Memory is also called skilled memory because it is memory for doing
things that usually involve learned skills. Also, semantic information is linked to the
ability to carry out various skills.
2. Priming occurs when the presentation of one stimulus changes the way a person
responds to another stimulus. Repetition Priming occurs when the test stimulus is the
same as or resembles the priming stimulus.
1. Korsakoff’s Syndrome is associated with alcohol abuse and eliminates the ability
to form new long-term memories.
2. Propaganda Effect occurs when participants are more likely to rate statements
they have read or heard before as being true, simply because they were exposed
to them before.
3. Classical Conditioning occurs when the following two stimuli are paired: (1) a
neutral stimulus that initially does not result in a response and (2) a conditioning
stimulus that does not result in a response. Conditioning is often related to emotional
reactions.
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Memory Loss in Movies:
1. Bourne series, related to a condition called psychogenic fugue — Symptoms of this
condition include traveling away from where the person lives and a lack of memory
for the past, especially personal information such as name, relationships, place of
residence, and occupation. In the few cases that have been reported, a person vanishes
from his or her normal life situation, often travels far away, and takes on a new
identity unrelated to the previous one (Coons & Milstein, 1992; Loewenstein, 1991).
2. Who am I? (1998) Dead Again (1991) The Long Kiss Goodnight (1996) The Vow
3. Memento (2000) related to HM’s case.
4. 50 First dates — a recent report documents the case of FL, a 51-year-old woman who
was treated for a head injury from an automobile accident; after she returned home,
she reported that every time she awoke she had no memory for the previous day—just
like Lucy in 50 First Dates (Smith et al., 2010)! But testing in the laboratory revealed
something interesting: FL performed well on materials she had learned on the same
day and exhibited no memory for material she knew had been presented on the
previous day. But if, without FL’s knowledge, material learned on the previous day
was intermixed with new material, she was able to remember the old material. Based
on a number of other tests, the researchers concluded that FL was not intentionally
making believe she had amnesia, but suggested that her symptoms may have been
influenced by her knowledge of how amnesia was depicted in 50 First Dates.

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