1. © 2010 by W. W. Norton & Co., Inc.
Interconnections Between
Acquisition and Retrieval
Chapter 6
Lecture Outline

2. Chapter 6: Acquisition and Retrieval
 Lecture Outline
 Learning as Preparation for Retrieval
 Encoding Specificity
 Different Forms of Memory Testing
 Implicit Memory
 Theoretical Treatments of Implicit Memory
 Amnesia

3. Chapter 6: Acquisition and Retrieval
3

4. Learning as Preparation for Retrieval
 Learning connects new material with
existing memory
 These retrieval paths help us learn new
material

5. Learning as Preparation for Retrieval
 Context-dependent learning is dependent on
the state one is in during acquisition

6. Learning as Preparation for Retrieval
 Context-dependent learning
Worse memory
Worse memory
Better memory
Better memory

7. Learning as Preparation for Retrieval
No change better
Change worse

8. Learning as Preparation for Retrieval
 Context reinstatement, or re-creating the
context present during learning, improves
memory performance (Fisher & Craik,
1977)
 However, although the external
environment is important at the time of
encoding in creating multiple pathways for
retrieval, other studies have shown that
simply creating the same internal state
that you had at the time of encoding is
sufficient to serve as a retrieval cue.

9. Learning as Preparation for Retrieval
 Fisher & Craik (1977)
 Participants told to remember the second
word of a word pair that was semantically
related or rhymed
 During testing, the prime words were
presented as cues or hints

10. Learning as Preparation for Retrieval
Depth of processing
Context reinstatement

11. Encoding Specificity
 Encoding specificity—remembering something
within a specific context

12. Encoding Specificity
 “The man _word_ the piano.”
Context Word Best cue word
Heavy lifted Something heavy
Music tuned Something with a nice
sound

13. Encoding Specificity
 Explains why only
one interpretation will
be drawn
 Encoding specificity
also explains why
memory for having
seen an ambiguous
figure depends on the
interpretation being
the same at encoding
and retrieval.

14. Spreading Activation
 Spreading activation travels from one
node to another, via the associative links
 Similar to neurons
 Input sums to reach a threshold, causing firing
 Activation levels below the response
threshold, so-called subthreshold activation
 Activation is assumed to accumulate, so that
two subthreshold inputs may add together
and bring the node to threshold.
 warmed up, so that even a weak input will be
sufficient to bring the node to threshold.

15. Spreading Activation
 We have seen this notion of networks and
spreading activation earlier in the course in our
discussion of feature nets

16. Spreading Activation
 Networks suggest an explanation for why hints
help us remember
Subthreshold
activity
Subthreshold
activity
Sums

17. Spreading Activation
 State-dependent learning and context
reinstatement
Context Material
Normal cues
Learning
Testing
Context
Better retrieval
If you are in the same context during testing, the learned material will
receive preactivation from these connections.

18. Spreading Activation
Bread
Related concepts
Wheat, white,
butter, sandwich
Faster responses
lexical-decision task

19. Different Forms of Memory Testing
 Recall
 Generate item with or without a cue
 “What was the name of the restaurant that we
went to?”
 Requires search through memory

20. Different Forms of Memory Testing
 Recognition
 Decide if an items is the right one
 “Is this the name of the restaurant?”
 If source memory is available, recognition
responses are similar in mechanism to recall
 “Yes, I saw this word before.”
(recollection/remember)
 In other cases, recognition responses are based
on a feeling of familiarity (know)
 “This feels familiar, so I must have seen it recently.”

21. Different Forms of Memory Testing
 Recognition
 Dual process vs single process
 Can rely on source memory, similar to recall
 “Yes, I saw this word before.”
 Or on familiarity
 “This feels familiar, so I must have seen it recently.”

22. Different Forms of Memory Testing

23. Different Forms of Memory Testing
 Source memory and familiarity are also
distinguishable neuroanatomically
 Participants asked to judge whether a
particular item was encountered
(“remember”) or if they had a feeling of
familiarity (“know”)

24. Different Forms of Memory Testing
Smaller rhinal
cortex with
familiarity
Larger
hippocampal
cortex with
recollection

25. Implicit Memory
 Indirect memory tests
 Look at how a second encounter yields different
responses than the first

26. Implicit Memory
Movie
Word or lexical
decision
Cat Movie
Word presented
a second time
Faster reaction
Time
even if the person is
not aware of it.
Dessert Faucet

27. Implicit Memory
27
Repetition
improves
memory
Explicit memory
Implicit memory

28. Implicit Memory
Complete word stem
E_ _ P_ _N_Several minutes of class

29. Implicit Memory
 Results like these led to the distinction between
two kinds of memory
 Explicit memory
 Direct memory testing, such as recall or recognition
 Conscious
 Implicit memory
 Indirect memory testing, such as a priming task
 Unconscious

30. Implicit Memory
 “False Fame” Study by Jacoby et al. (1989).
Shown list of fictitious names Later, shown a list of famous people
and fictitious names
Asked to rate fame
Some fictitious names rated as
famous

31. Implicit Memory
 Illusion of truth—an effect of implicit
memory in which claims that are familiar
end up seeming more plausible

32. Implicit Memory
 In one study demonstrating an illusion of truth,
 Statements that were heard before—even
those that had been labeled as false—were
later judged to be more credible than
sentences never heard before
 Gail Logan says that crocodiles sleep with
their eyes open

33. Implicit Memory
 Another misattribution of a familiarity effect can
be observed in frequently misspelled words

34. Implicit Memory
 Source confusion
 Eyewitness may select
someone from a photo
lineup based only on
familiarity, not on
actual recall

35. Theoretical Treatments of Implicit Memory
 People may be influenced by memories that they
are not aware of
 May have familiarity without episodic memory
 May be influenced without a feeling of familiarity

36. Theoretical Treatments of Implicit Memory
 Implicit memory involves processing
fluency—an improvement in the speed or
ease of processing
 Recently encountered items are easier to
recognize a second time
 For instance, just as seeing a stimulus raises
the activation level of the relevant detectors,
perceiving a word or thinking about its
meaning leads to a similar preactivation or
fluency in the relevant cognitive mechanisms.

37. Theoretical Treatments of Implicit Memory
 Processing fluency may underlie the feeling of
familiarity for stimuli that we have previously
encountered

38. Memory Types
38
There are many forms of implicit memory

39. Amnesia
 The distinction between explicit and
implicit memory is also supported by
evidence from cases of brain damage
 Amnesia is a disruption of memory due to
brain damage

42. Amnesia
 Clyde Wearing
 Good memory for generic information
 Love for his wife
 Unable to remember events
 Disrupted episodic memory but intact semantic
memory
 video
42

43. Amnesia
 Retrograde amnesia = loss of memory
before disruption
 Anterograde amnesia = inability to form
new long-term memories

44. Amnesia
 H.M.
 Severe epilepsy
 Severe anterograde amnesia, unable to form
new long-term memories
 HM video (6:40)

45. Amnesia
 Korsakoff’s syndrome
 Deficiency of thiamine (vitamin B1) because
of alcoholism
 Severe anterograde amnesia

46. Amnesia
 Anterograde amnesia
 No loss of existing memories.
 Damage to the hippocampus and surrounding
brain regions
 Difficulty forming new long-term memories

47. Amnesia
 Amnesia supports the distinction between
explicit and implicit memory
 Anterograde amnesia affects explicit
memory, while implicit memory is
preserved

48. Amnesia
 For instance, in 1911 Swiss neurologist Édouard
Claparède performed an informal experiment
with a Korsakoff-syndrome patient
 When introducing himself to the patient, he hid a
pin in his hand, which pricked the patient
 Later, the patient could not explicitly remember
Claparède but refused to shake his hand, saying,
“Sometimes pins are hidden in people’s
hands.”

49. Amnesia
 Amnesic patients demonstrating preserved
implicit memories without explicit memory
 Knowing the answer to a trivia question the second
time around
 Preferring a musical melody that they had been
exposed to before

50. Amnesia
 Anterograde
amnesics can learn
new implicit tasks
(procedural learning
task).
 Preserved implicit
with impaired explicit
memory.
A good example of an implicit task that can be shown in an image is
drawing a star using a mirror.

51. Amnesia
 Double dissociation
 Impairment of explicit with preserved implicit (HM)
 Impairment of implicit with preserved explicit (?)

52. Amnesia
SMO46: explicit memory with no fear
WC1606: fear with no explicit memory
Controls show both
explicit memory and a
fear response
(Bechara et al., 1995)
One patient had damage to the hippocampus but an intact amygdala,
while the other patient had damage to the amygdala and an intact
hippocampus.
a blue light was followed by a loud boat horn

53. Amnesia
 Hippocampus damage
 Fear with no memory
 Amygdala damage
 Memory with no fear

54. Amnesia
 The data from amnesia echo an earlier point
about the relationship between learning and
memory retrieval
 The nature of a disruption in the acquisition of
new memories depends on how the memories
will be used or retrieved later on

55. Amnesia
 What you are learning about memory is relevant
for how to memorize the material in this course
 At one level, you may want to learn the material
in a manner that prepares you for the form of
retrieval that is required for your exams
 To make memory even stronger, the best
strategy is to employ multiple perspectives,
creating multiple retrieval paths for the material
you want to learn

56. Chapter 6 Questions

57. 1. Which of the following is an advantage of
connecting new information to prior
knowledge in several different ways?
a) It “cements” the new material in memory
less securely, so the neurons are more likely
to decay.
b) It only allows state-dependent learning to
take place.
c) It improves your implicit memory for the
information.
d) It allows the information to be accessed from
multiple retrieval paths.

58. 2. Which of the following is true regarding recall
performance?
a) Recall performance is usually better than
recognition performance.
b) Recall performance does not benefits from
context reinstatement.
c) Whether a clue about a word’s sound is
more helpful for recall than a clue about its
meaning depends on how the word was
thought of when it was learned.
d) Physical context is more important to recall
than psychological context.

59. 3. A question like, “What’s the name of the
doctor?” requires _____; a question like,
“Isn’t that the guy we usually see at the
gym?” requires _____.
a) recall; recognition
b) recognition; recall
c) source memory; familiarity
d) familiarity; source memory

60. 4. Which of the following provide evidence for a
dissociation between familiarity and source
memory?
a) It is common to realize that a face is familiar
but be unable to place it; it is also possible to
have source memory without familiarity.
b) People’s patterns of brain activity are
different when they are making judgments
based on familiarity than when they are
making judgments based on familiarity plus
source memory.
c) Source memory is promoted by creating
memory connections; familiarity can be
promoted merely by sustained exposure.
d) all of the above

61. 5. Which testing method mainly targets
implicit, rather than explicit, memory?
A) recognition tasks
b) sentence verification
c) recall tasks
d) word-stem completion

62. 6. In which of the following situations are
you LEAST likely to decide a stimulus is
familiar?
a) Processing fluency is quite low.
b) Processing fluency is at the level you had
expected.
c) You can recall when and where you last
saw the stimulus.
d) Processing fluency is high and you
attribute this to the stimulus being very
beautiful.

63. 7. The dangers of source confusion are NOT
particularly relevant to which real-world
situation?
a) eyewitness identification
b) false fame effect
c) jury selection
d) misattribution