PSYA01H3 Lecture Notes - Lecture 17: Implicit Learning
Good example of retrieval cue: songs from high school. Across the Universe by the
Beatles: Fall of grade 11!; Rope by Foo Fighters: Middle of grade 12!
We have trouble telling the real data from our assumptions. Example: Joordens was
waiting for a bus looking west down Morningside, car coming out of gas station, another
car hit it from the side. He stuck around, cops came. Because he’s a prof, they asked
him. Cops asked Joordens if the car came straight through intersection. Joordens
almost said that the car did, even though he did not know because the intersection was
behind him. He assumed from the speed.
!(assumptions go into memory, Joordens doesn’t trust his memory at all)
We remember bits and pieces, but our mind has notions about how world looks and fills
the rest, and we think we’re replaying it. Memory is not a replay, it’s a reconstruction.
We encode the important stuff.
State-dependent learning/transfer appropriate processing: It is easier to accurately
retrieve some specific bit of information when the retrieval context (internal or external)
is as similar as possible to the context in which the information was learned.
!Example: Scuba-diving: You have slates, so you can write underwater. Four
participant groups. Showed them words and later retrieved. Group 1: studied outside
water, tested outside water. Group 2: studied outside, tested inside Group 3 studied
under, tested outside Group 4: studied inside, tested inside. Results: strongly showed
that those for whom context remained the same, they remembered it much better. So,
Groups 1 and 4 did the best.
You remember stuff you learned when you were drunk when you are drunk. Works with
other drugs too. Or moods.
Transfer appropriate processing; while you’re studying, read a paragraph and create
multiple choice questions to study!
You can learn certain things by not trying. But not information.
!Example: Claparede: medical doctor worked with a lot of patients with brain
damage, amnesia. Doctor would come everyday to say hello, patient won’t remember
him. She never would. He saw her everyday. After a while, “do you remember my
name?” She won’t. He started hiding a pin in his hand when he came, she’ll get pricked
when shaking hands. Three days later, she’d refuse to shake his hand. She’d feel
uncomfortable shaking his hand and doesn’t remember him pricking her or who he is,
but she’d say “sometimes people hide things in their hands”. So, without conscious
memory, she learned something.
!So, amnesiacs can learn things in a way, more about how world works.
Retrospective amnesia: remember nothing, nothing about themselves, etc. Rare,
happens more in soap operas.
Prospective amnesia: inability to remember new information, often with hippocampus
damage.
