forgetting an inability to retrieve from ltm. but is forgetting necessarily a retrieval failure?...

Forgetting

An inability to retrieve from LTM

But is forgetting necessarily a retrieval failure?

• “RetrievaI failure” implies the information is there and just not accessible.

• Was it inadequately stored, or learned, when we acquired it?

• Has it actually decayed with time?

Important questions, because we would like to know

• How might we minimize forgetting?

• How can we remember what we wish and forget what we’d rather forget?

• Should we attempt to interfere with forgetting, or does forgetting serve an essential purpose?

Hermann Ebbinghaus

• In 1885, using himself as subject, studied forgetting, using nonsense syllables (why?)

• Plotted a forgetting curve, testing himself at various intervals after learning, and found that memory did decline with time passage

I. Transience

Pattern of forgetting over time

• Early theorists suggested that decay of memories accounts for forgetting

• Some evidence does suggest that unused memories are forgotten.

Interference

• Recent research suggests much more forgetting occurs due to Interference

• Proactive Interference: Previously learned information inhibits our ability to remember new information

• Retroactive Interference: New information inhibits our ability to remember old information

• Especially potent when retrieval cues are identical or very similar

(e.g., learning new/forgetting old locker combinations)

II. Blocking

Temporary inability to retrieve something known

Very common: forgetting the name of a CD, someone’s name you know, etc.

TOT Phenomenon

• Experienced as inability to recall a fact, word, name, etc., that we are absolutely certain we know and have stored in LTM;

The memory is temporarily inaccessible.

For example,

>Patronage bestowed on a relative, in business or politics is

• Often due to interference from words similar in sound, number of syllables, 1st letter, etc.: they keep recurring as we try to remember target word

>An astronomical instrument for finding position is

III. Absentmindedness

Inattentive or shallow encoding of events

Where your keys are, name of person you just met, whether you took your vitamins, etc.

• Described as explaining “change blindness” – inability to detect changes to an object or scene

• Well-known example: individual asking directions “changes” to another person

Amnesia

• Extreme forgetting: inability to retrieve vast quantities of information from LTM

• Anterograde and retrograde