Assignment

Introduction to Psychology

Course No: PSY- 2217

Submitted to:

Rezwana Sultana

Course Instructor

School of Business & Economics

United International University

Submitted by:

Md. Omor Faruk

ID: 111 142224

Section: G

Trimester: Summer 2015

School of Business & Economics

United International University

UNITED INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY

September 3, 2015

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Table of Content

Reason behind choosing 01

Memory 02

Sensory Memory 02

I Iconic Memory 03

II Echoic Memory 03

Short-term Memory 03

I Repetitive Rehearsal 04

II Elaborative Rehearsal 04

Long-term Memory 04

Types of long-term memory 04

Declarative Memory 05

Procedural Memory 05

Why we forget 05

I Decay Theory 06

II Interference 06

a Proactive Interference 06

b Retroactive Interference 06

III Cue-dependent Theory 06

About Introduction to Psychology 07

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Reason for choosing ‘Memory’

The reason for choosing the chapter ‘the foundation of memory’ for my assignment is many. First of all while studying the chapter about memory I found it very interesting. When I read the chapter I came to know about many important things how our memory works actually. Additionally, I also researched myself about memory after reading this chapter. They met many question of my mind. In our lives often some question come to our mind and they are, what the thing actually memory is and how it does works etc. It is really a mysterious matter how the information’s are saved in our brain. And this chapter unveiled many of the answers. From this chapter I came to know that, our memory is built on three basic processes. They are encoding, storage and retrieval. And there are three types of memory and they are sensory memory, short-term memory, and long-term memory. This chapter is full of surprising information. Like, information initially recorded by the person’s sensory system enters sensory memory which momentarily holds the information. Then the information moves to short-term memory where it stays for 15 to 25 seconds and it moves to long-term memory which is relatively permanent time basis. In this chapter, the biological base of memory is also deserved. It clarifies the lobes and spaces of our brain where our memories stored and processed. I also found out the transformation of information into a memory reflected at the level of neurons. At the end I have to say any other topic than ‘memory’ could make me very interested to know. I have found this chapter fit with my curiosity that’s why I have chosen this chapter for my assignment.

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MemoryIn psychology, memory is the process in which information is encoded, stored and retrieved. In another way we say that memory refers to the processes that are used to acquire, store, retain and later retrieval information. There are three major processes involved in memory: Encoding, Storage, and Retrieval.

In order to form new memories, information must be changed into a usable form, which occurs through the process known as encoding. Encoding is the first stage in remembering something. Encoding allows information that is from the outside world to reach our senses in the forms of chemical and physical stimuli. We must change the information so that we may put the memory into the encoding process. Once information has been successfully encoded, it must be stored in memory for later use. This entails that we maintain information over periods of time. If the information is not stored adequately, it can’t be recalled later. The last stage of this process is retrieval. Information in memory storage has to be located and brought into awareness to be useful. So we say it the retrieval process allows us to bring stored memories into conscious awareness.

The three-system memory theory proposes the existence of the three separate memory stores. These are:

Sensory Memory:

Sensory memory is the earliest stage of the memory. It is the initial, momentary storage of information. Here information lasting only an instant. The ability to look at an item and remember what it looked like with just a split second of observation, or memorization is the example of sensory memory. It is out of cognitive control and is an automatic response. The first experiments exploring this form of sensory memory were conducted by George Sperling (1963). He briefly exposed that people to a series of 12 letters arranged in the following pattern. When exposed to this pattern of letters for just one twentieth of a second, most people could recall only four or five of the letters accurately. Although, they knew that they had seen more, the memory of those letters had faded by the time they reported the first few letters. It was get possibility if the information had initially and accurately stored in sensory memory. But it was very short time and in this time it took to verbalize the first four or five letters, the memory of the other letters faded away.

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There are several types of sensory memory each related to a different source of sensory information.

I. Iconic Memory: Iconic Memory is a fast decaying store of visual information. That means it’s a type of sensory memory that briefly stores an image which has been perceived for a small duration. While sensory memory can store information for only a very short time. If information does not pass into short-term memory, it is lost for good. For instance, iconic memory seems to last less than a second.

II. Echoic Memory: Echoic memory is a fast decaying store of auditory information. It is another type of sensory memory that briefly store sound that has been perceived for short duration. Here if information does not pass into short-term memory, it is lost for good. And Echoic memory typically fades within two or three seconds.

Short-term Memory:

Short-term memory known as active memory and it is simply about these information we are currently aware of or thinking about it. Short-term memory holds information for 15-25 seconds. So we say about the short-term memory is that it is the memory store in which information first has meaning and although the maximum length of retention there is relatively short. Its capacity is very limited. An experiment by George A. Miller showing that the store of short-term memory was 7(+ or -) items. Short-term memory is believed to rely mostly on an acoustic code for storing information and to a lesser extent a visual code.

There is no specific process by which sensory memories are transformed into short-term memories. But some theories suggest that the information is first translated into graphical representations or image, and others hypothesize refers that the transfer occurs when the sensory stimuli are changed to word. These theories or way to transfer from sensory memory to short-term memory is described in below.

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I. Repetitive Rehearsal: It is occurs simply repeated information over and over again. As an example we might do with a telephone number. Think that we rush a phone number from the phone book to the phone. It is kept current in short-term memory because of we repeat over and over that specific phone number. But it will not necessarily be placed in long-term memory. Instead, as soon as possible if we stop punching in the phone number, the number is likely to be replaced by other information and will be completely forgotten.

II. Elaborative Rehearsal: Elaborative rehearsal occurs when the information is considered and organized in some fashion. It is much more likely to be transferred into long-term memory. The organization might include expanding the information to make it fit into a logical framework, linking it to another memory, turning it into an image or transforming it in some other way.

Long-term Memory:

Long-term memory refers to the continuing storage of information. In psychology long-term memory would be call the preconscious and unconscious. This information is largely outside of our awareness, but can be called into working memory to be used when needed. Some of this information is fairly easy to recall, while other memories are much more difficult to access. The storage of sensory memory and short-term memory generally has a strictly limited capacity and duration. By contrast, long-term memory can store much larger quantities of information for potentially unlimited limitation. Its capacity is immeasurably large. For example, given a random 7 digit number we may remember it for only a few second before forgetting. That means it was stored in our short-term memory. On the other hand, we can remember telephone numbers for many years through repetition, this information is said to be stored in long-term memory. Through the process of association and rehearsal, the content of short-term memory can become long-term memory. While long-term memory is also susceptible to the forgetting process, long-term memories can last for a matter of days to as long as many decades.

Types of Long-Term Memory: Long-term memory is usually divided into two types - declarative (explicit) memory and procedural (implicit) memory.

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Declarative includes all of the memories that are available in consciousness. Declarative memory can be further divided into episodic memory (specific events) and semantic memory (knowledge about the world).

Procedural memory involves memories of body movement and how to use objects in the environment. How to drive a car or use a computer are examples of procedural memories.

Why we forget our saved memories:

Forgetting typically involves a failure in memory retrieval. While the information is somewhere in your long-term memory, you are not able to actually retrieve and remember it. Of course, many factors can help contribute to forgetting. Sometimes you might be distracted when you learn new information, which might mean that you never truly retain the information long enough to remember it later. That means the reason for your memory failure is that you probably never encoded the information into long-term memory initially. And if the information was not placed in memory to start with, there is no way the information can be recalled. Well-known memory researcher Elizabeth Loftus has proposed four key explanations for why forgetting occurs.

The forgetting curve also showed that forgetting does not continue to decline until all of the information is lost. At a certain point, the amount of forgetting levels off. What exactly does this mean? It indicates that information stored in long-term memory is surprisingly stable.

What are some of the major reasons why we forget information? Several processes account for memory failure, including decay, interference, and cue-dependent forgetting. These three process works for forgetting our information from our long-term memory.

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I. Decay theory: Decay is the loss of information through non-use. According to this theory, a memory trace is created every time a new theory is formed. Decay theory suggests that over time, these memory traces begin to fade and disappear. If information is not retrieved and rehearsed, it will eventually be lost. Although there is evidence that decay does occur, this does not seem to be the complete explanation for forgetting.

II. Interference: In interference, information in memory disrupts the recall of other information. When information is very similar to other information that was previously stored in memory, interference is more likely to occur. There are actually two sorts of interference that influence forgetting:

a. Proactive interference.

b. Retroactive interference.

a. Proactive interference: Proactive is occurring when an old memory makes it more difficult or impossible to remember a new memory.

b. Retroactive interference: In contrast, Retroactive refers to difficulty in the recall of information because of later exposure to different material. That means it occurs when new information interferes with your ability to remember previously learned information.

III. Cue-dependent theory: Finally, forgetting may occur because of cue-dependent theory. Forgetting that occurs when there are insufficient retrieval cues to rekindle information that is in memory. For example, once you realize that you lost your cars key and you may not be able to remember where you lost your key until you mentally walk through your day, thinking of each place you visited.

Most research suggests that interference and cue-dependent forgetting are key processes in forgetting. We forget things mainly because new memories interfere with the retrieval of old ones or because appropriate retrieval cues are unavailable, not because the memory trace has decayed.

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About Introduction to Psychology

The course ‘Introduction to Psychology’ has been a very useful and informative for me. As a human we all need to have at least a bit of knowledge about psychology. And this course met the need of us. At first, from the chapter ‘Introduction to Psychology’ I learned about the controversies centre on how much human behaviour is a product of nature, conscious or unconscious thought, observe actions internal thoughts etc. And we also got ideas about how in future psychology will be specialized. Secondly, from the chapter ‘learning’ how we learn and how learning new things changed our behaviours we gather about this knowledge. From this chapter I also came to know about classical conditioning stimulus and extinction. After that we read about ‘Memory’ and in this chapter we found much precious information about how our memory works and the classification of memory. This chapter also contains information about the biological bases of memories besides how psychology has been applying in 21st century. We also find the reason why do we forget and the reason of a common disease Alzheimer’s and brain Deterioration. After that Motivation and Emotion chapter teach us what is emotion, the functions of emotion etc. The theories given by various neuron scientists are also given in this chapter. The identification of specific parts of the brain that are activated during the experience of particular emotions is also mentioned here. Additionally, we also learned how motivation is related with various factors. The various approaches about motivation are also mentioned. After that come ‘development’ this chapter describes how we get developed ourselves in the various stages of our life. The theories about child rearing practices and child protector case works are found here. Finally, ‘Health psychology and Stress’ teach us how psychology can be applied to prevent, diagnosis and treatment of medical problems. ‘Stress’ is also described in this chapter. And the way to reduce stress is shown here. In this chapter we see the psychology factors affect health and health related problems, such as coronary heart disease, cancer and smocking. This chapter also shows us why it is necessary to diagnosis psychological stages of a person along with physical problems.To sum up, I must say this course is very useful and valuable to us. I got a lot of experience of my life from psychology. To interact with other people we have to know about our psychology. To evaluate any person even sometimes ourselves we have to know some certain things about our mental condition. So, this course will help us to know, judge and understand people around us as well as ourselves better.

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