Types of long term memory

• LTM is the storage of memory over a lengthy period of time
• Main guy: Tulving
• LTM store is potentially unlimited
• Endel Tulving (1985) realised MSM was too simple
• Proposed the idea that LTM has 3 stores: episodic memory, semantic memory and procedural memory
• Long term memory divides into declarative memory (explicit) and non-declarative memory (implicit)
• Episodic memory is the recollection of time-stamped, personal experiences
• The strength of the emotion at the time dictates how strong an episodic memory is
• Episodic memory is autobiographical
• Semantic memory is the recalling of facts, ideas and concepts (general knowledge)
• Semantic memory concerns knowledge that is commonly shared- not personal
• Semantic memory is encoded in the frontal and temporal lobe (brain scan studies prove this)
• Semantic memory is explicit
• Procedural memory involves retrieving information to complete a task (movement based)
• procedural memory does not need to be consciously thought about
• Procedural memory is the store for skills we may struggle to explain to someone else
• STRENGTHS

  • clinical evidence (patient HM and Clive Wearing)
  • Neuroimaging (Buckner and Peterson 1996 found episodic and semantic memories were recalled from the prefrontal cortex)
  • Real life application (can help people with mild cognitive impairments improve their memory)
• LIMITATIONS

  • problems with clinical evidence (cannot measure the change in memory before and after a brain injury as they are unexpected)