Memory refers to the processes by which people and other organisms encode, store, and retrieve
Information. Memory is critical to humans and all other living organisms. Practically our entire
daily activities—talking, understanding, reading, and socializing—depend on our having learnt
and stored information about our environments. Memory allows us to retrieve events from the
distant past or from moments ago. It enables us to learn new skills and to form habits.
Memory and Learning are Closely Related
The two terms often describe roughly the same processes. The term learning is often used to
refer to processes involved in the initial acquisition or encoding of information, whereas the term
memory more often refers to later storage and retrieval of information. However, this distinction
is not hard and fast.
After all, information is learned so that it can be retrieved later, and retrieval cannot occur unless
information was learned. Thus, psychologists often refer to the learning/memory process as a
means of incorporating all facets of encoding, storage, and retrieval.
• Memory is usually considered as the storehouse of information alone but, as just mentioned
• Memory is the process of encoding, storing and retrieving information.
Woodworth defined memory as: Memory = L - I - R
• “L” is the act of “learning”.
• “I” is the time interval, or duration between the act of learning and remembering; and
• “R” refers to the act of “remembering”.
Functions of Memory
i. Encoding
ii. Storage
iii. Retrieval,
Encoding is the process of perceiving information and bringing it into the memory system.
Encoding is not simply copying information directly from the outside world into the brain.
Rather, the process is properly conceived as recoding, or converting information from one form
to another. The human visual system provides an example of how information can change forms.
Light from the outside world enters the eye in the form of waves of electromagnetic radiation.
The retina of the eye converts this radiation into bioelectrical signals that the brain interprets as
visual images. Similarly, when people encode information into memory, they convert it from one
form to another to help them remember it later.
Storage
In the storage part of the memory processes information saved in the memory is maintained in an
identifiable form.
Retrieval
The information recorded and stored is approached, located, brought into awareness, and used
under the memory retrieval system.
Encoding and storage are necessary to acquire and retain information. But the crucial process
in remembering is retrieval, without which we cannot access our memories. Unless we retrieve
an experience, we do not really remember it. In the broadest sense, retrieval refers to the use of
stored information. For many years, psychologists considered memory retrieval to be the
deliberate recollection of facts or past experiences.
The Memory Storage Systems: Memory Storehouses
i. Sensory Memory
ii. Short - term Memory
iii. Long - term Memory
Sensory Memory
• Storage of memory lasting for a while; this is the initial momentary stage.
• Sensory memory refers to the initial, momentary recording of information in our sensory
systems. When sensations strike our eyes, they linger briefly in the visual system. This kind of
sensory memory is called iconic memory and refers to the usually brief visual persistence of
information as it is being interpreted by the visual system.
Short-term Memory/ Working Memory
• Psychologists originally used the term short-term memory to refer to the ability to hold
information in mind over a brief period of time. As conceptions of short-term memory expanded
to include more than just the brief storage of information, psychologists created new
terminology. The term working memory is now commonly used to refer to a broader system that
both stores information briefly and allows manipulation and use of the stored information.
The term long-term memory is somewhat broad meaning phrase because it can refer to facts
learned a few minutes ago, personal memories many decades old, or skills learned with practice.
Generally, however, long-term memory describes a system in the brain that can store vast
amounts of information on a relatively enduring basis. When you play cricket, remember what
you had for dinner last night, recall your first birthday party, and remember how to play a board
game, or to sing along to a favorite song; for all this you draw on information and skills stored in
long-term memory.
Forgetting
Forgetting is the inability to retrieve or recall information from the long- term memory.
Forgetting may occur due to a number of factors such as:
• Information discarded / decayed due to the non- use of the learned material.
• At times we know something, but are unable to access and retrieve it properly.
S - Q - 3R
• A five- step approach. S-Q-3R is an approach for improved learning and recall of material to be
Learned.
S = Surveying and skimming.
Q = Questioning: asking questions about what one has read.
3R’s:
Read: Going through the surveyed material thoroughly.
Recite: Recitation makes learning active than passive and adds activity to learning.
Review: Reviewing and going through the learnt material from time to time