type of long term memory

• What is episodic memory?

  LTM forms memories of life events

  e.g storing events such as birthdays

  declarative - can be expressed verbally, involving 'knowing that' something is true

  requires conscious thought and effort to remember

  time-stamped - stored regarding time, place, associated emotions, etc
• What is semantic memory?


  LTM for factual and general knowledge about the world

  e.g capital cities and the meaning of words, etc

  declarative - can be expressed verbally, involving 'knowing that' something is true.

  available for conscious inspection - recalling semantic memories is deliberate and requires conscious

  not time-stamped - knowledge is recalled without remembering when or where it was learned
• What is procedural memory?

  LTM for motor skills and learned actions

  e.g tying a shoelace or driving a car

  non-declarative knowledge-> cannot necessarily be expressed verbally, focused on 'knowing how' to do things

  not open for conscious inspection-> typically recalled without conscious effort

  not time-stamped ->knowledge is recalled without remembering when or where it was learned

  acquired through repetition and practice, becoming automatic skills and habits.
• clinical evidence

  P: strength - support from clinical studies

  E: HM understood what a dog was but could not recall stroking one earlier

  E: HM knew how to walk and speak

  L: therefore there are different LTM stores
• counterpoint

  P: limitation - lack control of variables

  E: Brain injuries are usually unexpected so the researcher does not know ppt before the injury

  E: this makes it hard to determine whether a ppts memory had gotten worse than before the injury

  L: therefore clinical studies are limited in what they tell us about memory
• conflicting evidence

  P: limitation - conflicting evidence

  E: semantic memory - left side of the prefrontal cortex

  episodic memory - right side

  E: however other evidence links left prefrontal cortex - encoding of episodic memories

  right prefrontal cortex - retrieval of episodic memories

  L: therefore evidence for types of memory challenged
• real-world application

  P: strength - real-world application

  E: harder to recall episodic memories as we age

  E: researcher devised an intervention to help the elderly with episodic memories and trained ppts did better than the control group

  L: therefore different types of LTM helps enable specific treatments