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Recall in memory refers to the mental process of retrieving information from the past. Along with encoding and storage, it is one of the three core processes of memory. There are three main types of recall: free recall, cued recall and serial recall. test these forms of recall as a way to study the memory processes of humansrecall. (2010). In Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved March 04, 2010, from Encyclopædia Britannica Online: http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/493353/recall [1] and animals. Two main theories of the process of recall are the two-stage theory and the theory of encoding specificity.
Another two stage theory holds that free recall of a list of items begins with the content in working memory and then moves to an associative search.Tarnow, E. (2015). FIRST DIRECT EVIDENCE OF TWO STAGES IN FREE RECALL. RUDN Journal of Psychology and Pedagogics, (4), 15-26.
In 1885, Hermann Ebbinghaus created nonsense syllables, combinations of letters that do not follow grammatical rules and have no meaning, to test his own memory. He would memorize a list of nonsense syllables and then test his recall of that list over varying time periods. He discovered that memory loss occurred rapidly over the first few hours or days, but showed a more steady, gradual decline over subsequent days, weeks, and months. Furthermore, Ebbinghaus discovered that multiple learning, over-learning, and spacing study times increased retention of information.Ebbinghaus, Hermann. (1885). On Memory (H.A Ruger & C.E Bussenius, Trans.) New York: Dover, 1964. Ebbinghaus' research influenced much of the research conducted on memory and recall throughout the twentieth century.
Frederic Bartlett was a prominent researcher in the field of memory during the mid-twentieth century. He was a British experimental psychologist who focused on the mistakes people made when recalling new information. One of his well-known works was Remembering: A Study in Experimental and Social Psychology, which he published in 1932. He is well known for his use of North American Native folk tales, including The War of the Ghosts.Bartlett, F.C. (1932). Remembering: A Study in Experimental and Social Psychology. Cambridge University Press. Retrieved from http://ematusov.soe.udel.edu/EDUC390.demo/Articles/The%20war%20of%20the%20ghosts.htm . He would provide participants in his study with an excerpt from a story and then asked them to recall it as accurately as they could. Retention intervals would vary from directly after reading the story to days later. Bartlett found that people try to understand the overall meaning of the story. Since the folk tale included supernatural elements, people would rationalize them to make them fit better with their own culture. Ultimately, Bartlett argued that the mistakes that the participants made could be attributed to "schematic intrusions" - current knowledge interfering with recall.
In the 1950s there was a change in the overall study of memory that has come to be known as the cognitive revolution. This included new theories on how to view memory, often likening it to a computer processing model. Two important books influenced the revolution: Plans and Structures of Behavior by George Miller, Eugene Galanter, and Karl H. Pribram in 1960 and Cognitive Psychology by Ulric Neisser in 1967. Both provided arguments for an information-processing view of the human mind. Allen Newell and Herbert A. Simon constructed computer programs that simulated the thought processes people go through when solving different kinds of problems.Newell, Allen & Simon, Herbert. (1961). Computer simulation of human thinking. Science, 134, (2011-2017), Retrieved from http://psycnet.apa.org/?fa=main.doiLanding&uid=1962-05907-001.
In the 1960s, interest in short-term memory (STM) increased. Before the 1960s, there was very little research that studied the workings of short-term memory and rapid memory loss. Lloyd and Margaret Peterson observed that when people are given a short list of words or letters and then are distracted and occupied with another task for few seconds, their memory for the list is greatly decreased. Atkinson and Shiffrin (1973) created the short-term memory model, which became the popular model for studying short-term memory.Atkinson, R.C & Shiffrin, R.M. (1971) "The Control of Short Term Memory" Scientific American 225, (82-90), Retrieved from http://suppes-corpus.stanford.edu/techreports/IMSSS_173.pdf
The next major development in the study of memory recall was Endel Tulving's proposition of two kinds of memory: episodic and semantic. Tulving described episodic memory as a memory about a specific event that occurred at a particular time and place, for example what you got for your 10th birthday. Semantic memory are abstract words, concepts, and rules stored in long-term memory.Endel Tulving. (1972). "Episodic and Semantic Memory" in Organization of memory, (381-403), Retrieved from http://alicekim.ca/EMSM72.pdf. Furthermore, Endel Tulving devised the encoding specificity principle in 1983, which explains the importance of the relation between the encoding of information and then recalling that information. To explain further, the encoding specificity principle means that a person is more likely to recall information if the recall cues match or are similar to the encoding cues.Endel Tulving (2001). Retrieved from http://www.science.ca/scientists/scientistprofile.php?pID=20&pg=1.
The 1960s also saw a development in the study of visual imagery and how it is recalled. This research was led by Allan Paivio, who found that the more image-arousing a word was the more likely it would be recalled in either free recall or paired associates.Paivio, Allan. (1969). Mental Imagery in Associative Learning and Memory. Psychological Review 76, (241-263), Retrieved from http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/rev/76/3/241/.
There has been a considerable amount of research into the workings of memory, and specifically recall since the 1980s. The previously mentioned research was developed and improved upon, and new research was and still is being conducted.
There are two basic experimental methods used to conduct cued recall, the study-test method and the anticipation method. In the study-test method participants study a list of word pairs presented individually. Immediately after or after a time delay, participants are tested in the study phase of the experiment on the word pairs just previously studied. One word of each pair is presented in a random order and the participant is asked to recall the item with which it was originally paired. The participant can be tested for either forward recall, Ai is presented as a cue for Bi, or backward recall, Bi is presented as a cue for Ai. In the anticipation method, participants are shown Ai and are asked to anticipate the word paired with it, Bi. If the participant cannot recall the word, the answer is revealed. During an experiment using the anticipation method, the list of words is repeated until a certain percentage of Bi words are recalled.
The learning curve for cued recall increases systematically with the number of trials completed. This result has caused a debate about whether or not learning is all-or-none. One theory is that learning is incremental and that the recall of each word pair is strengthened with repetition. Another theory suggests that learning is all-or-none, that is one learns the word pair in a single trial and memory performance is due to the average learned pairs, some of which are learned on earlier trials and some on later trials. To examine the validity of these theories researchers have performed memory experiments. In one experiment published in 1959, experimental psychologist Irvin Rock and colleague Walter Heimer of the University of Illinois had both a control group and an experimental group learn pairs of words. The control group studied word pairs that were repeated until the participants learned all the word pairs. In the experimental group, the learned pairs remained in the list while unlearned pairs were substituted with recombinations of previous words. Rock believed that associations between two items would be strengthened if learning were incremental even when pairs are not correctly recalled. His hypothesis was that the control group would have a higher correct recall probability than the experimental group. He thought that repetition would increase the strength of the word pair until the strength reaches a threshold needed to produce an overt response. If learning were all or none, then the control group and the experimental group should learn the word pairs at the same rate. Rock found experimentally there was little difference in learning rates between the two groups. However, Rock's work did not settle the controversy because in his experiment he rearranged replaced word pairs that could be either easier or harder to learn than the original words in the word- digit pair. In further experiments that addressed the question, there were mixed results. The incremental learning hypothesis is supported by the notion that awhile after Ai-Bi pairs are learned, the recall time to recall Bi decreases with continued learning trails.
Another theory that can be tested using cued recall is symmetry of forward and backward recall. Forward recall is generally assumed to be easier than backward recall, i.e. forward recall is stronger than backward recall. This is generally true for long sequences of word or letters such as the alphabet . In one view, the independent associations hypothesis, the strength of forward and backward recall are hypothesized to be independent of each other. In another view, the associative symmetry hypothesis, the strengths of forward and backward recall are about equal and highly correlated. In S.E Asch from Swarthmore College and S. M Ebenholtz's experiment, participants learned pairs of nonsense syllables by anticipation recall. After reaching a certain threshold of learning, the participants were tested by free recall to determine all pairs and single items they could remember. These researchers found that backward association was greatly weaker than forward association. However, when the availability of forward and backward recall were basically the same, there was little difference between forward and backward recall. Some scientists including Asch and Ebenholtz believe in the independent association hypothesis think that the equal strengths of forward and backward recall are compatible with their hypothesis because forward and backward recall could be independent but with equal strengths. However associative symmetry theorists interpreted the data to mean that the results fit their hypothesis.
Another study done using cued recall found that learning occurs during test trials. Mark Carrier and Pashler (1992) found that the group with a study-only phase makes 10% more errors than the group with a test-study phase. In the study-only phase, participants were given Ai-Bi, where Ai was an English word and Bi was a Siberian Eskimo Yupik word. In the test study phase, participants first attempted to recall Bi given Ai as a cue then they were shown Ai-Bi pair together. This result suggests that after participants learn something, testing their memory with mental operations helps later recall. The act of recalling instead of restudying creates new and longer lasting connection between Ai and Bi. This phenomenon is commonly referred to as the testing effect.
Another study showed that when lists are tested immediately after study, the last couple of pairs are remembered best. After a five-second delay, the recall of recently studied words diminishes. However, word pairs at the beginning of a list still show better recall. Moreover, in a longer list, the absolute number of word pairs recalled is greater but in a shorter list of word pairs, the percentage of word pairs recalled is greater.
Sometimes, when recalling word pairs, there is an intrusion. An intrusion is an error that participants make when they attempt to recall a word based on a cue of that word pair. Intrusions tend to have either Semantics attributes in common with the correct word not recalled or have been previously studied in another word pair on the current list or a previously studied list or were close in time to the cue item. When two items are similar, an intrusion may occur. Professor Kahana and Marieke Vugt at the University of Pennsylvania examined the effects of face similarity for face-name associations. In the first experiment, they wanted to determine if performance of recall would vary with the number of faces in the study set that were similar to the cue face. Faces were similar if the radius of the faces were within a range. The number of faces within a radius is called a neighborhood density. They found that the recall of a name to face exhibited a lower accuracy and slower reaction time for faces with a greater neighborhood density. The more similarity that two faces have, the greater the probability for interference between the two faces. When cued with face A, name B may be recalled if face A and B are similar, which would signify that an intrusion has occurred. The probability of correct recall came from the number of faces that had other similar faces.
Cues act as guides to what the person is supposed to remember. A cue can be virtually anything that may act as a reminder, e.g. a smell, song, color, place etc. In contrast to free recall, the subject is prompted to remember a certain item on the list or remember the list in a certain order. Cued recall also plays into free recall because when cues are provided to a subject, they will remember items on the list that they did not originally recall without a cue. Tulving explained this phenomenon in his research. When he gave participants associative cues to items that they did not originally recall and that were thought to be lost to memory, the participants were able to recall the item.
Serial recall in long-term memory (LTM) differs from serial recall in short-term memory (STM). To store a sequence in LTM, the sequence is repeated over time until it is represented in memory as a whole, rather than as a series of items. In this way, there is no need to remember the relationships between the items and their original positions. In STM, immediate serial recall (ISR) has been thought to result from one of two mechanisms. The first refers to ISR as a result of associations between the items and their positions in a sequence, while the second refers to associations between items. These associations between items are referred to as chaining, and is an unlikely mechanism, according to research. Position-item relationships do not account for recency and primacy effects, or the phonological similarity effect. The Primacy Model moves away from these two assumptions, suggesting that ISR results from a gradient of activation levels where each item has a particular level of activation that corresponds to its position. Research has supported the fact that immediate serial recall performance is much better when the list is homogenous (of the same semantic category) than when they are heterogeneous (of different semantic category). This suggests that semantic representations are beneficial to immediate serial recall performance. Short-term serial recall is also affected by similar-sounding items, as recall is lower (remembered more poorly) than items that do not sound alike. This is true when lists are tested independently (when comparing two separate lists of similar-sounding and not similar-sounding items) as well as when tested using a mixed list. Alan Baddeley first reported such an experiment in which items within a list were either mutually dissimilar or highly similar.
There is evidence indicating that rhythm is highly sensitive to competing motor production. Actions such as paced finger tapping can have an effect on recall as the disruptive impact of paced finger tapping, but lack of consistent effect of paced irrelevant sound, is indicative of motor feedback from the tapping task disrupting rehearsal and storage.
Eight different effects are generally seen in serial recall studies with humans:
According to neuroimaging data, PET studies on recall and recognition have consistently found increases in regional cerebral blood flow (RCBF) in the following six brain regions: (1) the prefrontal cortex, particularly on the right hemisphere; (2) the hippocampal and parahippocampal regions of the medial temporal lobe; (3) the anterior cingulate cortex; (4) the posterior midline area that includes posterior cingulate, retrosplenial (see retrosplenial region), precuneus, and cuneus regions; (5) the inferior parietal cortex, especially on the right hemisphere; and (6) the cerebellum, particularly on the left.
The specific role of each of the six main regions in episodic retrieval is still unclear, but some ideas have been suggested. The right prefrontal cortex has been related to retrieval attempt; the medial temporal lobes to conscious recollection; the anterior cingulate to response selection; the posterior midline region to imagery; the inferior parietal to awareness of space; and the cerebellum to self-initiated retrieval .Backman, L., Almkvist, O., Andersson, J., Nordberg, A., Winblad, B., Reineck, R., & Lingstrom, B. Brain activation in young and older adults during implicit and explicit retrieval. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, (9) 3.
In recent research, a group of subjects was faced with remembering a list of items and then measured when trying to recall said items. The evoked potentials and hemodynamic activity measured during encoding were found to exhibit reliable differences between subsequently recalled and not recalled items. This effect has been termed the subsequent memory effect (SME).Rugg MD, Allan K (2000) Event-related potential studies of memory. In: The oxford handbook of memory (Tulving E, Craik FIM, eds), pp 521–537. Oxford: Oxford UP. This difference in these specific brain regions determines whether or not an item is recalled. A study by Fernandez et al. has shown that the differences that predict recall appear both as a negative deflection in the rhinal cortex of an event-related potential (ERP) 400 ms after stimulus exposure, and as a positive hippocampal ERP beginning 800 ms after stimulus onset. This means that recall only occurs if these two brain regions (rhinal cortex and hippocampus) are activated in synchrony.
One's attention to words is impacted by emotion grasping vocabulary. Negative and positive words are better recalled than neutral words that are spoken. Many different ways that attention is focused on hearing what the speaker has to say are the inflection of the presenter's voice in a sad, content, or frustrated sound or in the use of words that are close to the heart. A study was conducted to observe if the use of emotional vocabulary was a key receptor of recall memory. The groups were put into the same lecture halls and given the same speakers, but the results came back to determine that the inflection and word choice recalled by the listeners concluded that emotional words, phrases, and sounds are more memorable than neutral speakers.
Recall memory is linked with instincts and mechanisms. In order to remember how an event happened, to learn from it or avoid an agitator, connections are made with emotions. For instance, if a speaker is very calm and neutral, the effectiveness of encoding memory is very low and listeners get the gist of what the speaker is discussing. On the other hand, if a speaker is shouting and/or using emotionally driven words, listeners tend to remember key phrases and the meaning of the speech. This is full access of the fight or flight mechanism all people have functioning in the brain, but based on what triggers this mechanism will lead to better recall of it. People tend to focus their attention on cues that are loud, very soft, or something unusual. This makes the auditory system pick up the differences in regular speaking and meaningful speech, when something significant is spoken in the discussion people home in on the message at that part of the speech but tend to lose the other part of the discussion. Our brains sense differences in speech and when those differences occur the brain encodes that part of speech into memory and the information can be recalled for future reference.
A study by Block and Ghoneim (2000) found that, relative to a matched group of healthy, non-drug-using controls, heavy marijuana use is associated with small but significant impairments in memory retrieval.cannabis induces loss of internal control and cognitive impairment, especially impairment of attention and memory, for the duration of the intoxication period.
Stimulants, such as cocaine, amphetamines or caffeine are known to improve recall in humans. However, the effect of prolonged use of stimulants on cognitive functioning is very different from the impact on one-time users. Some researchers have found stimulant use to lower recall rates in humans after prolonged usage. The axons, dendrites, and neurons wear out in many cases. Current research illustrates a paradoxical effect. The few exceptions undergo mental hypertrophy. Methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) users are found to exhibit difficulties encoding information into long-term memory, display impaired verbal learning, are more easily distracted, and are less efficient at focusing attention on complex tasks. The degree of executive impairment increases with the severity of use, and the impairments are relatively long-lasting. Chronic cocaine users display impaired attention, learning, memory, reaction time and cognitive flexibility. Whether or not stimulants have a positive or negative effect on recall depends on how much is used and for how long.
Studies have tested the difference between what men and women can recall after a presentation. Three speakers were involved, one being female and two being male. Men and women were put into the same lecture hall and had the same speaker talk to them. The results suggested that information presented by the women speaker was more easily recalled by all the members of the study. Researchers believe this to be a significant difference between genders because women's voices have better acoustics, ranging from low tones to high tones. Since their voices have this range, semantic encoding is increased for the pitches that stimulate the auditory component of the brain; this resonates better in the ear function. Since pitch ranges from low tones to high tones, it draws people's attention to the words attributed with the tone. As the tone changes, words stand out and from these differences memories can be stored. Recall is made easier since the association the brain can make is between words and sounds spoken.
A distinguishing feature is how males and females process information and then recall what was presented to them. Females tend to remember nonverbal cues and associate the meaning of a discussion with gestures. Since males follow verbal cues they react more to the facts and actual words within a discussion to recall what was said, but fluctuations in the speaker's voice helps them maintain the memories. Another difference that sets males and females apart is recalling someone's voice. They tend to recall information they have read, for instance, lists of objects are better recalled for men than women. The only similarity they have is that when emotional words are used or an emotional tone is produced, males and females tend to recall those changes.
In a study of women experiencing Premenstrual Syndrome, they were either given a placebo beverage or a carbohydrate-rich one. The patients were tested at home; their moods, cognitive performance, and food craving were measured before the consumption of the beverage and 30, 90, and 180 minutes after consumption. The results showed that the carbohydrate-rich beverage significantly decreased self-reported depression, anger, confusion, and carbohydrate craving 90 to 180 minutes after consumption. Memory word recognition also improved significantly.
The Method of Loci (MOL) refers to an individual visualizing a spatial environment to improve later recall of information. Instead of merely reading a list of items, individuals mentally walk along a path, placing things that subsequently need to be remembered. This elaborate rehearsal provides the opportunity to manipulate information during the encoding process. For example, from the store, you need peanut butter, toothpaste, dog food, and laundry detergent. Instead of repeating the list, imagine yourself eating a peanut butter sandwich, afterwards walking to the bathroom to brush your teeth, then walking by your dog on the way to the laundry room. This improving recall method does not appear to be limited to merely recalling a list of items. Research demonstrated that this cognitive strategy improved student performance on assessments. Participants were divided into two groups, each receiving the same medical lectures, followed by either self-learning or using the Method of Loci. Each group was subsequently given the same assessment on the learned information and the Method of Loci group performed better, as measured by the number of correct responses.
Psycholinguistics views TOT states as a failure of retrieval from lexical memory (see Cohort Model) being cued by semantic memory (facts). Since there is an observed increase in the frequency of TOT states with age, there are two mechanisms within psycholinguistics that could account for the TOT phenomenon. The first is the degradation of lexical networks with age, where degrading connections between the priming of knowledge and vocabulary increases difficulty of successfully retrieving a word from memory. The second suggests that the culmination of knowledge, experience, and vocabulary with age results in a similar situation where many connections between a diverse vocabulary and diverse knowledge also increases the difficulty of successful retrieval of a word from memory.
The metacognitive perspective views TOT states simply as the awareness felt when such an event occurs and the perception of the experience involved. Mainly being aware of a TOT state can result in the rapid devotion of cognitive resources to resolving the state and successfully retrieving the word from memory. Such an explanation leaves much to be desired; however, the psycholinguistic perspective and the metacognitive perspective on TOT states are not mutually exclusive and both are used to observe TOT states in a laboratory setting.
An incubation effect can be observed in TOT states, where the passage of time alone can influence the resolution of the state and result in successful recall. Also, the presence of a TOT state is a good predictor that the problem can be resolved correctly, although this has been shown to occur more frequently with older-young-adults than young-adults or seniors. This is evidence for both the metacognitive perspective as well as the psycholinguistic perspective. It demonstrates the devotion of resources to searching memory, a source of cumulative information, for the desired correct information, and it also shows that we are aware of what information we know or do not know. This is why the current debate between the psycholinguistic view of TOTs as retrieval failure and the metacognitive view of TOTs as a tool for learning continues.
Similar phenomena include déjà vu (already seen), jamais vu (never Seen), and déjà entendu (already heard). These occur rarely and are more prevalent in patients with traumatic head injuries, and brain disorders including epilepsy.
Involuntary autobiographical memory (IAM) retrieval occurs spontaneously as the result of as well as internal cues, such as thought or intention. These cues influence us in our day-to-day lives by constantly and automatically activating unconscious memories through priming. It has been demonstrated in many studies that our specific goals and intentions will most frequently result in the retrieval of related IAM, while the second most frequent IAM retrievals result from physical cues in the surrounding context. Autobiographical memories that are unrelated to any specific cues, whether internal or external, are the least frequent to occur. It has been suggested that in this case, an error in self-regulation of memory has occurred that results in an unrelated autobiographical memory reaching the conscious mind. These findings are consistent with metacognition as the third type of experience is often identified as the most salient one.
Involuntary semantic memory retrieval (ISM), or "semantic-popping", occurs in the same fashion as IAM retrieval. However, the elicited memory is devoid of personal grounding and often considered trivial, such as a random word, image, or phrase. ISM retrieval can occur as a result of spreading activation, where words, thoughts, and concepts activate related semantic memories continually. When enough related memories are primed that an interrelated concept, word, thought, or image "pops" into consciousness and you are unaware of the extent of its relatedness within your memory. Spreading activation is thought to build over a period of many hours, days, or even weeks before a random semantic memory "pops".
Total recall is also popular in television. It can be seen in Season 4 of the television show "Criminal Minds", in which the character Dr. Spencer Reid claims to have total recall ability."Criminal Minds"
[3] Agent Fox Mulder from the television show "The X-Files" has a photographic memory, a popular term for total recall.BBC - Cult - X-Files - personal file: Fox Mulder. (2005, September). Retrieved from http://www.bbc.co.uk/cult/xfiles/personnel/mulder.shtml [4] Also, the character of hospital resident Lexie Grey on the television show "Grey's Anatomy" has total recall ability.Lexie Grey (Chyler Leigh) - Bio - Grey's Anatomy - ABC.com. (n.d.). Retrieved from
Movies tend to show amnesia as a result of head injury from accidents or attacks. The loss of identity and autobiographical memory shown in Santa Who? (2000) in which Santa has amnesia that destroys his identity and memory of himself is very unlikely in the real world. This is also portrayed in The Bourne Identity (2002) and The Bourne Supremacy (2004) where the main character forgets he is a trained assassin. Another misrepresentation of the reality of memory loss in the movies can be seen in Clean Slate (1994) and 50 First Dates (2004) where the characters are able to encode memory during the day but lose all memory of that day at night, while sleeping.
Movies often restore affected person's memory through a second trauma, or through a kind of cued recall when they revisit familiar places or see familiar objects. The phenomenon of the second trauma can be seen in Singing in the Dark (1956) where the affected individual experiences the onset of amnesia because of the trauma of the Holocaust, but memory is restored with a blow to the head. Although neurosurgery is often the cause of amnesia, it is seen as a solution in some movies, including Deluxe Annie (1918) and Rascals (1938).
Memory erasure is portrayed in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) and in the Men in Black movies. Men in Black features a device to erase the potentially harmful memories of extraterrestrial interactions in members of the general public. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind describes a process that targets and erases memories of interpersonal relationships the patients would rather forget so that they are no longer able to recall the experience. In Paycheck (2003) and Total Recall (1990) memory suppression is used to control and the characters are able to overcome the attempts and recall pieces of their memory.
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