Remembering &
Judging
Introduction to Psychology
By Charles Stangor
Conceptualization of Memory
Memorie
s as
Types
Memories as Types
Explicit Memory Knowledge or experiences that can be
consciously remembered.
• episodic memory Explicit memory about the firsthand
experiences that we have had.
• semantic memory Explicit memory about our knowledge of
facts and concepts about the world.
Assessment of Explicit Memory
• Recall memory test (correct vs, incorrect)
• Recognition memory test (correct vs. incorrect)
• Relearning (or savings) (how much, how fast)
Recall memory test
• Questions that prompt students to explain,
compare, or summarize concepts, ensuring that
they must access and organize information
from long-term memory to construct their
response.
• Explain the process of decision-making.
• Compare and contrast explicit and implicit
memory.
Memories as Types
Implicit memory The influence of experience on behavior, even
if the individual is not aware of those influences.
• procedural memory Implicit memory about our often
unexplainable knowledge of how to do things.
• conditioning effect often without effort or awareness, to associate neutral
stimuli(such as a sound or a light) with another stimulus(such as food), which creates a
naturally occurring response, such as enjoyment or salivation.
• priming changes in behavior as a result of experiences that
have happened frequently or recently.
Assessment of Implicit Memory
• Word fragment test
Stages of Memory
The length of time that information remains available to us.
Stages of Memory
Sensory Memory
• The brief storage of sensory information.
• To give the brain some time to process the incoming
sensations.
Iconic memory
• The visual sensory memory. (1/4 of a second, 250 milliseconds)
Echoic memory
• The auditory sensory memory. (lasts for 4 seconds)
Stages of Memory
Short-Term Memory (STM)
• Memory where small amounts of information can be kept for more than a few
seconds but less than one minute.
• Limited in length and amount of information.
Working memory
• The processes that we use to make sense of, modify, interpret, and store
information in STM.
Maintenance rehearsal
• The process of repeating information mentally or out loud with the goal of
keeping it in short-term memory.
• Digit span 5 to 9 (7 +/-2 magic number, mobile numbers)
Chunking
• The process of organizing information into smaller groupings (chunks), thereby
increasing the number of items that can be held in short-term memory.
The Structure of LTM: Categories, Prototypes, and Schemas
Category
• A network of associated memories that have features in common
with each other.
Prototype
• The member of the category that is most average or typical of the
category.
Schema
• A pattern of knowledge in long-term memory that helps us organize
information.(Quaid-e-Azam, Birthday celebration, online shopping,
doing laundry, Mobile phone, stereotypes-social groups)
ACCURACY AND INACCURACY IN MEMORY AND COGNITION
Cognitive biases
•Errors in memory or judgment that are caused
by the inappropriate use of cognitive
processes.
Accuracy versus inaccuracy in perception
Decision-making skills
1. Source Monitoring: Did It Really Happen?
Source monitoring
• The ability to accurately identify the source of a memory.
Sleeper effect
• Attitude change that occurs over time when we forget the
source of information.
Uncertainty about the source of a memory may lead to
mistaken judgments.
2. Schematic Processing:
Distortions Based on Expectations
Confirmation bias
• Tendency to verify and confirm our existing
memories rather than to challenge and disconfirm
them.
Once beliefs become established, they become
self-perpetuating and difficult to change.
2. Schematic Processing:
Distortions Based on
Expectations
Functional fixedness
• A cognitive bias that occurs when people’s
schemas prevent them from using an object in
new and nontraditional ways.
Creativity may be impaired by the overuse of
traditional, expectancy-based thinking.
3. Misinformation Effects:
How Information That Comes Later Can Distort Memory
Eyewitnesses who are questioned by the police may change their memories of
what they observed at the crime scene.
• “About how fast were the cars going when they hit each other?”
• “About how fast were the cars going when they smashed each other?”
• “About how fast were the cars going when they contacted each other?”
4. Overconfidence
Overconfidence
• Tendency for people to be too certain about their ability to
accurately remember events and to make judgments.
Eyewitnesses may be very confident that they have accurately
identified a suspect, even though their memories are incorrect.
Flashbulb memory
• A vivid and emotional memory of an unusual event that people
believe they remember very well.
5. Heuristic Processing: Availability and Representativeness
Heuristic
• An information-processing strategy that is useful in many cases but may lead to errors when
misapplied. (to avoid complexity)
Representativeness heuristic
• Mental shortcuts like using stereotypes to judge people
(representativeness heuristic)
• A cognitive bias that may occur when we base our judgments on information that seems to
represent, or match, what we expect will happen.
Availability heuristic
• making decisions based on the most recent information you can recall
(availability heuristic)
• Tendency to make judgments of the frequency or likelihood that an event occurs on the
basis of the ease with which the event can be retrieved from memory.
• We may overestimate the crime statistics in our own area, because these crimes are so easy
to recall.
6. Salience and Cognitive
Accessibility
Salient
• Attracting attention
• Things that are unique, colorful, bright, moving, and unexpected are more
salient
• We may base our judgments on a single salient event while we ignore
hundreds of other equally informative events that we do not see.
Cognitive accessibility
• The extent to which knowledge is activated in memory, and thus likely to be
used in cognition and behavior.
• We may think that we contributed more to a project than we really did
because it is so easy to remember our own contributions.
• Poets, sensitive and intelligent people
7. Counterfactual Thinking
Counterfactual thinking
• A cognitive bias that involves the tendency to think
about and experience events according to “what might
have been.”
• We may feel particularly bad about events that might
not have occurred if only a small change had occurred
before them.