Cognitive Psychology Midterm 2

Front 1

Atkinson-Shiffrin memory model

Back 1

sensory input --> sensory memory --> attention --> short term (working) memory --> encoding --> long term memory

Front 2

sensory memory (echoic vs. iconic)

Back 2

function of sensory memory: allows further info processing, provides us with smooth perception of our environment
visual sensory memory = iconic memory
auditory sensory memory = echoic memory

Front 3

echoic memory vs. iconic memory: duration

Back 3

Iconic: varied time between display of matrix of letters/numbers and the onset of the tone which indicates recall of a specific row; as delay increased, so did recall; claim: iconic memory ~1 sec

Echoic memory: duration ~4-5 sec (as delay of the cue to change from shadowing one list to another got farther and farther, the percent of people who detected the digit decreased)

Front 4

echoic vs. iconic memory: capacity

Back 4

iconic: ~9 items; Sperling task (shown matrix of letters and numbers and had to recall either as many as possible (full report) or specific row according to the tone (partial report)) showed that they reported perceiving much of the array but losing the info quickly (capacity is bigger than duration)

echoic memory: not as much research for capacity as on iconic, but likely holds less than iconic

Front 5

Sperling task (partial vs. full report)

Back 5

Full report: Ss shown 50 ms of a matrix of letters/numbers, then recall as much as possible; results: could recall 4 items (33%), but reported seeing more
Partial report: given same matrix, then heard one of 3 tones that corresponds to each row, asked to repeat whichever row it responded to; results: reported 75% no matter which row, which suggests Ss must have been equally prepared to report any of the rows, claimed that sensory memory help 9 items)

As delay between display of letters & onset of tone increases, recall decreases (iconic memory duration ~1 sec)

Front 6

short term vs. long term memory: duration

Back 6

STM: 20-30 seconds (depends on rehearsal & interference); study: Ss memorized syllables & count backwards by 4's, then recall after certain number of seconds, results: longer interval delay resulted in less syllables recalled

LTM: weeks-years

Front 7

short term vs. long term memory: capacity

Back 7

STM: 7 +/- 2 (affected by chunking, word length effect)

LTM: theoretically unlimited

Front 8

short term memory vs. long term memory: why the distinction?

Back 8

James: primary memory (reward portion of present, conscious experience, effortless retrieval) vs. secondary memory (genuine past, unconscious/permanent, effortful retrieval)

Computer analogy: RAM = STM, Hard drive = LTM

Evidence: serial position curve & primacy/recency effect; HM shows recency but no primacy effect (can't form new memories)

Front 9

serial position curve

Back 9

shows primacy and recency effect when recalling a list of words; more recall for beginning and end of list than the middle; LTM accounts for primacy effect while STM accounts for recency effect

Front 10

anterograde vs. retrograde amnesia

Back 10

anterograde amnesia: inability to learn new facts of episode, still able to retain small amounts of info for a short time (30 sec)

retrograde amnesia: loss of old memories

Front 11

chunking

Back 11

combining small units of info into larger meaningful units; helps hold more info in STM

Front 12

Brown & Peterson: getting info into STM

Back 12

Ss memorized triagrams (THG) when had to count backwards by 4's; then had to recall triagrams after 3, 4, 9, 12, 15, and 18 seconds
Results: longer interval delay associated with less triagrams recalled (evidence for lack of rehearsal and interference causing loss of STM storage)

Front 13

working memory (definition, components, characteristics)

Back 13

definition: system involved in holding info in mind needed to complete complex tasks in the face of interfering processes and distractions

components: central executive, visuo-spatial sketchpad, phonological loop

characteristics: domain specificity (separable forms of processing, domain specific disruption), resource limited (situational demands can reduce WM resources available, some individuals have more WM resources to work with, emphasis on limits of attention not # of items stored)

Front 14

Kane and Eagle: stroop task and WM

Back 14

Stroop task presented to those with high WM and low WM; those with higher WM made less errors; higher % congruency caused more errors for all

Front 15

phonological loop vs. visual-spatial sketchpad

Back 15

separate components, but work together; patient PV showed poor STM verbal memory but intact STM for words presented spatially

Front 16

Brooks: visual vs. spatial resources

Back 16

spatial processing did not interfere with verbal processing
Imagery experiment: respond either verbally (easy) or spatially (hard) because primary task was spatial

Front 17

declarative vs. non-declarative memory

Back 17

declarative: episodic, semantic; explicit memory, consciously recalled facts and knowledge

non-declarative: procedural, conditioning, priming; implicit, unconscious memories such as skills

Front 18

long term memory (encoding, storage, retrieval)

Back 18

encoding --> storage --> retrieval
encoding: echoic and iconic
storage: STM, working memory, LTM

Front 19

episodic vs. semantic

Back 19

episodic memory: autobiographical memory, related to a specific experience
semantic memory: general information and knowledge

Front 20

procedural vs. conditioning vs. priming

Back 20

procedural memory: Beilock's soccer study; experts dribble better with right foot when doing a second task then when focused, novices do slightly worse with dual task

conditioning: ex. mere exposure effect (people prefer mirror image photo of selves while others prefer normal photo)

priming: facilitation in the processing of a stimulus because of a recent encounter with the same or related stimulus (ex. lexical decision task, RT decreases when prior words are related; Neely study)

Front 21

mere exposure effect

Back 21

all else equal, we like things better that we've seen previously
Ss preferred mirror image photo of themselves to normal ones, while family & friends preferred normal photo
fluency: previous exposure or experience impacts the ease with which an item is processed

Front 22

Beilock & Holt: novices/experts judging letter dyads, dual task

Back 22

When Ss given letter dyads, either typed with same or different fingers; expert typists preferred dyads that you type with different fingers because they're faster, novices preferred dyads at chance
dual task: taught motor task where Ss had to hit certain pattern when prompted by a character on the screen; then, showed character, had to judge dyads, then produce pattern (idea: using same brain area to hold pattern as typists would use for judging dyads)
results: novices still at chance for dual task; preference disappears for experts with dual task

Front 23

Lee & Schwarz: email/voicemail, mouthwash/hand sanitizer

Back 23

implicitly link abstract ideas about cleanliness and morality to physical cleanliness
After leaving mean voicemail, rate mouthwash as more desirable than after sending a mean email; vice versa for hand sanitizer

Front 24

Lee and Schwarz: post-decisional dissonance and handwashing

Back 24

Had Ss choose a product, those who didn't later wash their hands (ostensibly rating a hand soap) showed the expected preference for chosen product over rejected product; but those who washed their hands later did not show the same preference/dissonance reduction;
cleaning hands reduced the need to justify one's choice

Front 25

Ebbinghaus: percent savings of relearning

Back 25

had Ss memorize nonsense syllables; tested number of times it takes to relearn the material
showed that it increased over time, but stayed constant between 16 hours and 1 month (asymptote)
Suggests that LTM retains something after a long period of time

Front 26

implicit vs. explicit memory

Back 26

implicit memory: memory that is not deliberate of conscious but exhibits evidence of prior experience
explicit memory: conscious, intentional recollection of previous experiences and information

Reasons for dissociation: patient MT: impaired ability to find tee shots and remember strokes but could still golf well, procedural knowledge intact; HM & the mirror tracing task: improved over trials but did not remember performing the task, procedural knowledge intact

ex: Neely study

Front 27

Schacter: patient MT

Back 27

MT was a brain damaged patient who had an impaired ability to find tee shots and remember strokes, but could still play the game really well (showed that his procedural memory was intact)

Front 28

HM

Back 28

patient with damage to the hippocampus, showed that he improved over trials on the mirror tracing task, but did not remember performing the task (procedural knowledge was intact)

Front 29

Beilock et al: novice/expert soccer players, divided/skill-focused attention

Back 29

Experts performed better at a dribbling task when attention was divided between that and another task than when focused on the skill, novices performed slightly worse when attention was divided than skill-focused

Front 30

lexical decision task

Back 30

a task that looks at RT in deciding whether a string of letters is a word or not; can be used to test priming by looking at RT as a function of relatedness of the words (results: RT decreases when previous word(s) are related to the current word, than when they're unrelated)

Front 31

Neely: implicit vs. explicit effects on priming

Back 31

1) Expected no shift: told word would match category, word did match category, and it did (Bird: robin); Results: showed facilitation for 240 ms-2s
2) Unexpected shift: told word would match category, and it didn't (Bird: chair); Results: RT slowed between 240 ms-2s, and as time went on, Ss could mentally prepare more bird words, so RT decreased
3) Expected shift: told the word would not match the category, and it did not (Bird: chair); results: started off with no facilitation, then facilitation gets better as S has time to correct for explicit knowledge
4) Unexpected no shift: told word would not match category, but it did (Bird: robin); Results: started off with facilitation, then RT slows as time goes on because explicit knowledge takes over

Front 32

decay vs. interference

Back 32

two reasons why we forget episodes in memory
decay: memory fades when not rehearsing; ex: Brown-Peterson Task - Ss given 3 words to remember, then counted backwards by 3's from a 3 digit number, more time meant more forgetting

interference: similar items interfere with one another, making it difficult to remember; ex: Brown-Peterson task - harder to remember fruits when given repeated triads of fruits, then when given different semantic category, easier to remember

Front 33

Brown & Peterson with a twist: series of 3 words, manipulate semantic category

Back 33

Ss given groups of 3 words to remember, then had to count backwards by 3's from a 3 digit number; showed forgetting after time; showed that when given repeated triads from the same semantic category (fruits), recall gets worse as more triads are given, then when a new semantic category is presented, recall is much better

Front 34

proactive interference

Back 34

when old stuff gets in the way of new stuff, for example, when you park your car in the same lot every day and can't remember where it is (release of proactive interference: change word category)

Front 35

semantic networks

Back 35

cognitively based associations between concepts that are semantically related

Front 36

spreading activation

Back 36

a method of searching semantic networks which involves selecting and activating a certain concept, then propagating the activation to other connected concepts

Front 37

retroactive interference

Back 37

when new things get in the way of old things (ex: can't remember where you parked your car 3 weeks ago because of all of the times you've parked since)

Front 38

paired-associates learning task

Back 38

One group had a retrieval cue liked to a target memory (e.g. duck --> flag); another group had a retrieval cue linked to two separate words (duck --> flag and spoon); Results: in the latter condition, it was more difficult to recall either word (fan effect)

Front 39

fan effect

Back 39

when storing info in a semantic network, competing associations can make it more difficult to retrieve any one piece of information

Front 40

retrieval-induced forgetting

Back 40

repeated retrieval causes competing memory traces to become inhibited
Ex: practiced category (fruits), where some fruits were practiced (orange, not banana); and unpracticed category (drinks)
recall for unpracticed item in practiced category worse than unpracticed items in unpracticed categories -- actively inhibiting other items in the category

Front 41

Golden & Baddeley: underwater/on shore encoding/recall

Back 41

Had Ss encode information either underwater or on shore, then recall info either underwater or on shore; Results: interaction effect - recall was best when recalling where it was you encoded info

Front 42

encoding specificity vs. encoding variability

Back 42

encoding specificity: similar cues at encoding and retrieval lead to superior memory performance (on shore/underwater study); works because we associate cues with target material at the time of encoding, then those cues can be used at retrieval

encoding variability: multiple retrieval cues help retrieve target memory (Ss learned list one, where foot was listed with other body parts, or list two, where foot was listed with body parts and length measures; better remembering of the word foot for list two)

Front 43

schema

Back 43

ordered set of how to do particular activities (Bradford & Johnson laundry passage)

Front 44

Branford & Johnson: passage about washing clothes

Back 44

Give subjects a passage that describes the process of doing laundry (but is vague); if told it was about laundry, people recalled 5.8 ideas, if not told it was about laundry, only recalled 2.8 ideas

Front 45

Loftus: memory distortions; hit/bumped/crashed car accident

Back 45

if Ss were told that a car hit/bumped/crashed into another car, they remembered the speed of the car before the hit as being different, even though they watched the same video

Front 46

flashbulb memory

Back 46

memory for the moment of a shocking event (i.e. 9/11, Kennedy assassination)

Front 47

Talarico & Rubin: flashbulb/regular memory (consistency, vividness, confidence)

Back 47

Duke students recalled 9/11 attack and another memory from around the same time; asked to recall on 9/11, 7 days after, 42 days after, and 224 days after; results: showed same decay of memories & increase in inconsistent details for flashbulb & normal memory; however, people say the flashbulb memory is far more vivid, and have more confidence in the accuracy of the flashbulb memory

Front 48

levels of processing hypothesis

Back 48

how one rehearses is more important than how long one rehearses; i.e. shallow (physical) vs. deep (semantic) processing, recall is better for deeply encoded words

Front 49

Craik & Tulving: shallow/deep processing, context-dependent effects

Back 49

Ss asked several questions about a specific word (Is it printed in capital letters? [shallow, physical] Does it rhyme with another word? [moderate] Does it make sense in this sentence? [deep, semantic]); Later asked to recall the words they saw on the task; Results: 90% of people remember deeply encoded words, much less people remember shallow words, rhyming somewhere in the middle (only works for recall test, if given a test on rhyming then the original word would be remembered for moderate encoding)

Front 50

rule-based category learning

Back 50

list of necessary and sufficient features for that category, all category members are equally good examples
ex: in class demo, performance on deciding whether or not a figure fits a category (without knowing anything about the category) suddenly jumps from 50% (chance) to 100% once the pattern is determined

Front 51

prototype category learning

Back 51

average or prototype defines membership, the prototype possesses idealized category features

Front 52

Posner & Keele - old distortions/new distortions/prototype

Back 52

Ss had to learn to classify patterns of dots, then saw either old distortions of dots (that they learned on), new distortions of dots, or prototype of dot patterns (which they never saw, but have theoretically developed in their heads);
Results: about 88% correct for prototype, 87% correct for learned distortions, 67% correct for unlearned/new distortions
*evidence that we use these prototypes to define categories

Front 53

rule based vs. prototype category learning theories

Back 53

Both hold that categories are abstract representations or summaries
rule-based: list of necessary and sufficient features
prototype: abstract, idealized representation
Problems with rule-based view: some things are "better" category members than others, difficult to determine defining category features
Problems with prototype view: based on similarity of items, but may not work for all categorization (example: little fluffy dog may look more like a cat than a Great Dane, but it is part of the same category as the Great Dane); there are situational factors that need to be taken into account

Front 54

rule-based vs. information-integration category structure

Back 54

rule-based: follow specific list of necessary and sufficient features for categorization
information-integration: hard to verbalize rule, "feels" like something belongs in a category

Front 55

De Caro et al: High WM/Low WM, rule based/info-integration category

Back 55

Two conditions: Rule-based (if blue background, category A, if yellow background, category B): high WM individuals much better
Information-integration (complex formula that takes into account dot color, background color, number of dots, symbol shape): low WM better at this task because high WM trying to focus on specific rules
Interaction: based on category structure, whether high or low WM is better; main effect: overall, info-integration category structure harder to learn

Front 56

knowledge-based category learning

Back 56

situational factors (such as individual differences and experience) have to be taken into account, because similarity may not work for all categorization

Front 57

subordinate vs. basic vs. superordinate hierarchical levels

Back 57

subordinate level: parrot
basic level: bird
superordinate: animal
*as expertise increases, so does the level or categorization (bird experts will say parrot)

Front 58

Chi et al: physics profs/students categorize/solve physics problems

Back 58

Physics professors and students categorized physics problems, then solved them
Results: took professors longer to categorize problems (who used the overall problem category) than students (who used surface features)
But took profs a lot shorter to solve the problems (took students about the same amount of time to categorize and solve problems)

Front 59

surface features

Back 59

used by physics students to categorize problems, took less time than looking at the overall problem category (as the professors did)

Front 60

Gauthier et al: FFA = expert subordinate categorizing area

Back 60

Showed that car experts categorized cars at the subordinate level, and birds at the basic level; bird experts categorized cars at the basic level and birds at the subordinate level
Also showed activation for the FFA when categorizing the item of specialty

Front 61

Chase & Simon: expert/novice chess players, real/fake game boards

Back 61

chessboards either shown in the middle of gameplay or at random configurations; experts better at remembering gameplay than random configurations, novices equally bad at both, and experts showed about the same level of recall when random board

Front 62

Collins & Quillian: hierarchical semantic network

Back 62

People will be quicker to link words that are closer together in the semantic network

Front 63

DeCaro et al. FIgure 1

Back 63

shows that high WM individuals perform better at rule-based categorization, but low WM individuals perform better for information-integration categorization (but both groups perform worse on information-integration than rule-based)
Y-axis: trials it took before figuring out rule
X axis: category structure

Front 64

Gauthier et al: Figure 2

Back 64

shows activation of FFA for car and bird experts (y-axis) for various categories of stimuli (x-axis)
Objects: both car & bird experts show minimal activation
Cars: car experts show more activation than bird experts
Birds: bird experts show more activation than car experts
Faces: both car & bird experts show lots of activation (more than anything else, but about the same as each other)

Front 65

Reed: categorize drawn faces

Back 65

example of prototype categorization, where Ss had to categorize drawn faces into one of two categories, where they would determine a "prototypical" face, then compare other faces to this imaginary prototype

Front 66

Baddeley: memorize acoustically/semantically similar words

Back 66

STM participants: asked to recall list of acoustically (meet/feet/sweet) or semantically (neat/clean/tidy) words immediately after studying
LTM participants: asked to recall lists after a timed delay
Results: acoustically similar STM words were remembered least well and caused most confusion; semantically similar words remembered best for LTM (shows importance of semantic meaning for LTM)

Front 67

Lee and Schwarz: Figures 1 & 2 (physical and moral cleanliness)

Back 67

Figure 1 shows that evaluation of mouthwash was positive for people who had left malevolent voicemail and negative for hand sanitizer, opposite effects (positive for hand sanitizer and negative for mouthwash) for Ss who had send a malevolent email
Figure 2 shows that people who did not wash their hands after making a decision showed a small difference in rating for chosen and rejected object before choice, but a huge difference after choice (decisional dissonance reduction); but Ss who washed their hands showed similar (relatively small) differences in preference for chosen item over rejected item both before and after choice

Front 68

Beilock et al: Figure 1

Back 68

Shows that novice soccer players performed about equally for dual-task or skill-focused task when dribbling a soccer ball with their right foot (about same dribbling time, slightly more for the latter); experts showed that they dribbled better with their right foot for dual-task than skill-focused (spent less time dribbling for the former)
WIth the left foot, both novices and experts showed better performance (less dribbling time) for skill-focused than dual task (but experts were better than novices)

Front 69

Levinson et al: figure 1 (WM and mind wandering)

Back 69

shows that as WM capacity increases, % of time spent with the mind wandering during the low-perceptual-load visual search task also increased

Front 70

Conway et al: Figure 1 (cocktail party effect revisited)

Back 70

Shows that only 20% of low WM participants reported hearing their name in a stream of irrelevant info, while 65% of low WM participants reported hearing their name

Front 71

Nissen and Bullumer: random/repeating serial order task

Back 71

Ss performance on a light-tracking task improves dramatically with practice, but only if the lights are presented in a systematic, repeating pattern, not at random. Ss are much faster to track a 10-light sequence the 10th time they see it than the first time, but they don't explicitly notice the sequential pattern

Front 72

Jaeggie et al: WM training on a dual (visual and auditory) n-back task

Back 72

complex task in which Ss see a string of visual letters and numbers; in addition to a string of auditory syllables, and the same stimulus (for either modality) appearing n positions apart merits a signal; Jaeggie et al. argues that practicing these tasks can increase WM capacity which can generalize to fluid intelligence