Memory

Done By:

Tahani AlmudarraNajla AlRasheed

Amjaad Alsalamah

Memory is the ability of the mind to store and be able to recall information that is previously acquired.

A Model of Memory

Sensory Memory

During every moment of an organism's life, sensory information is being taken in by sensory receptors and processed by the nervous system. The information people received which is stored in sensory memory is just long enough to be transferred to short-term memory. Humans have five main senses: sight, hearing, taste, smell, touch. Sensory memory (SM) allows individuals to retain impressions of sensory information after the original stimulus has ceased.

Short-term memory

Short-term memory (or "primary" or "active memory") is the capacity for holding a small amount of information in mind in an active, readily available state for a short period of time. The duration of short-term memory (when rehearsal or active maintenance is prevented) is believed to be in the order of seconds.

Long-Term MemoryLong-term memory (LTM) is the final stage of the dual memory model proposed by Atkinson and Shiffrin, in which data can be stored for long periods of time. While short-term and working memory persists for only about 20 to 30 seconds, information can remain in long-term memory indefinitely.

Retrieval of Memories

When you want to remember something, you retrieve the information on an unconscious level, bringing it into your conscious mind at will. While most people think they have either a "bad" or a "good" memory, in fact, most people are fairly good at remembering some types of things and not so good at remembering others. If you do have trouble remembering something -- assuming you don't have a physical disease -- it's usually not the fault of your entire memory system but an inefficient component of one part of your memory system.

ForgettingForgetting refers to apparent loss or modification of information already encoded and stored in an individual's long term memory. It is a spontaneous or gradual process in which old memories are unable to be recalled from memory storage. Forgetting also helps to reconcile the storage of new information with old knowledge. Problems with remembering, learning and retaining new information are a few of the most common complaints of older adults. Memory performance is usually related to the active functioning of three stages. These three stages are encoding, storage and retrieval.

Memory Storage

Memory is processed through three fundamental processing stages: storage, encoding, and retrieval. Storing refers to the process of placing newly acquired information into memory, which is modified in the brain for easier storage. Encoding this information makes the process of retrieval easier for the brain where it can be recalled and brought into conscious thinking. Modern memory psychology differentiates between the two distinct types of memory storage: short-term memory and long-term memory.

Left-handers recall events more easily

MEMBERS of a family that is dominated by left-handers tend to be better at remembering events than facts.

Dr Stephen Christman and Dr Ruth Propper, of the University of Toledo in Ohio, they believe that the two halves of the brain work together in episodic memory to help remember events because left-handers and those with left-handedness - whose brains' halves work together more actively - recall events better than facts.

In two experiments, they found that people better remembered whether they had seen a word before if they were either related to left-handers or shown the word twice on different sides of the visual field, which stimulates both halves of the brain. Because lefties and their relatives seem to have larger corpus callosums, the bridges of neurons linking the brain's hemispheres, these results suggest that interaction between the two halves strengthens memory for events. "So left-handers probably do have a richer ability to recall their lives," Christman, himself a southpaw, says.

Left-handers, who make up 15 percent of the population, don't have a monopoly on memory, though. The experiments showed that semantic memory was stronger in those individuals with all right-handed relatives, or when words were presented to just one side of the visual field. Both groups also recognized words they had seen before with equal ease.

Christman says it's possible to induce ersatz left-handedness by moving the eyes from side to side, which gets both sides of the brain going. His own research indicates that 30 seconds of such eye motion can improve episodic memory by up to 50 percent.

9 Things You Didn't Know About Human

Memory!

Looking away helps your memory. According to research from the University of Stirling in Scotland, by looking away from the person who asked a question, our memory is better equipped to kick in. It seems that human faces and expressions are mentally captivating to us and clutter our concentration.

Seven is the magic number. Ever wonder why telephone numbers are 7 digits? Pioneer psychologist George A Miller theorized that our short term memory can hold around 7 items before we begin to forget them. Try it yourself. Have a friend make a list of 10 words or numbers. Read once and try to recall as many as you can. Most people top out at around 7.

Bad memories can be erased using electroshock therapy. Marijn Kroes, a neuroscientist at Radboud University Nijmegen in the Netherlands found that by deliberately timing electroconvulsive shocks, they could interrupt patient's memories of a disturbing event.

Women's memory is enhanced by a deep voice. Researchers from the University of Aberdeen King's College in Scotland and McMaster University in Canada found that women were able to recall more information when given by a man with a deep baritone versus a man with a high-pitched voice. Male memories did not appear to be influenced by the pitch of a female's voice.

You can be tricked into remembering things that didn't happen. Psychologist Elizabeth Loftus has performed many studies including one where subjects were told they had met Bugs Bunny at Disneyland. This is impossible since Bugs is a not a Disney character. Approximately 20 percent of the participants truly believed the fake memories as their own.

Insulin helps promote memory. We all know insulin is vital to regulating blood sugar levels, but scientists have also discovered that sniffing insulin seems to help those suffering with Alzheimer's by improving their memory functions. More trials are needed, but experts feel results are promising.

You can grow your brain for better memorization. A study done with London taxi cab drivers, over several years, showed that those who had been on the job the longest had grown a larger than normal hippocampus, the region of the brain responsible for memory.

Anomia. This is the technical word for when you are trying to remember something and "it's on the tip of your tongue".

We have more storage in our brain than we need. Paul Reber, professor of psychology at Northwestern University says "The human brain consists of about one billion neurons, amounting to more than a trillion connections. If your brain worked like a DVR in a television, you would have to leave the TV running continuously for more than 300 years to use up all that storage."

Memories can live on, even if we can't access them

• Could forgotten songs continue to live on inside our heads, without us knowing?

• In a 2013 report of a strange case in the journal Frontiers in Neurology, researchers described a woman who had musical hallucinations of song that she didn't recognize, but others did.

Brains may be programmed to forget infancy

• Our earliest childhood memories fade, and there's likely a reason for that, researchers say. Most often, people don't recall any memories from their earliest years of life, usually before age 3 or 4. This is called infantile amnesia.

Brains may be programmed to forget infancy

Scientists previously thought that early memories were there, but children just didn't have the language skills to verbalize them.

Brain injuries may cause forgetting

It is possible to lose memories before they even have a chance to become stored, due to injuries in the brain's structures that are specifically involved in handling memory formation, maintenance and recall. Damage to these areas can result in curious forms of amnesia.

Brain injuries may cause forgetting

• In one of the most-studied cases of such amnesia, Patient H.M. lost the ability to form any new memories after a part of his brain, the hippocampus, was removed during a surgery to treat his epilepsy.

• Another famous case records the story of Patient E.P., who had a similar fate after he had inflammation of the brain caused by a virus.

THE HUMAN MEMORY

Since time immemorial, humans have tried to understand what memory is, how it works and why it goes wrong. It is an important part of what makes us truly human, and yet it is one of the most elusive and misunderstood of human attributes.

ReferencesMinkel, J. (2001, October 23). Lefties May Possess Superior Memory for Events. Scientific American. Highfield, R. (2001, October 22). Left-handers recall events more easily.The Teleghraph. Retrieved August 2, 2015, from ://http

. . . / / / / /1360www telegraph co uk news worldnews northamerica usa183/ - - - - - .Left handers recall events more easily htmlMohs, P. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://science.howstuffworks.com/life/inside-the-mind/human-brain/human-memory3.htm

Why You Forget: 5 Strange Facts About Memory (LiveScience)By: Gholipour, http://www.livescience.com/44940-strange-facts-about-memory.html

Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sensory_memory Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short-term_memory Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long-term_memory Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forgetting