Psyco 350 Lec #18– Slide 1
Lecture 16 – Psyco 350, A1Winter, 2011
N. R. Brown
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Outline
Autobiographical Memory
• Methods of studying autobiographical memory
• Retention Factors
• Organization– hierarchical
– event-to-event & event cueing
• Retrieval Processes
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Autobiographical Memory: Methods
Cue-word Method
1. cue word event memoryi
2. event memoryi rate & date
Problems?
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Autobiographical Memory: Methods
Cue-word MethodProblems:
• verifying event
• dating accuracy
• subjectivity of ratings
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Autobiographical Memory: Methods
Diary Studies
• Diary Phase: Participants record (and rate) events soon after they happen.
• Test Phase: recall, cued-recall, recognition, dating rating.
Problems?
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Autobiographical Memory: Methods
Diary Studies
Problems:
• restrictions on participants & events
• generalizing from diarist to non-diarist
• generalizing from recorded events to non-recorded events.
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“The” Diary Study: Wagenaar (1986)
Diary Phase:
• each day for 5 YEARS: record 1 or more events:
Test Phase (following 5-yr diary period):
• 5 events/day
• cued recall:
1 cue 2 cues 3 cues critical detail
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Wagenaar (1986): Event Coding
For each event, specify:• who• what• where• when • critical detail
For each event, rate:• salience• involvement• pleasantness
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Wagenaar (1986): Results
Event Age affects event memory• cued recall: w/ age• cued recall still well above chance after 5 years
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Wagenaar (1986): Results
Affect affects event memory:• recall w/ emotional involvement• recall w/ pleasantness• unpleasant memories poorly recalled at first.
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Wagenaar (1986): Results
Distinctiveness affects event memory:• cued recall salience
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AM: Retention Factors
• Event Age
• Level of Affect
• Distinctiveness
• Long-term importance
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Retention Factors
Event Age: more recent events better recalled than older events.
• Reasons: decay, interference, retrieval failure, consolidation failure
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Retention Factors
Level of Affect: events that elicit strong emotional response better recalled than those that do not.
• affect related to vividness of initial encoding, rehearsal/importance
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Retention Factors
Distinctiveness: distinctive/unique events tend to be remember better than mundane/repetitive events
• Reasons: – mundane events tend to be schematized
– for unique events, content-based retrieval cue accesses only one event memory.
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Retention Factors
Long-term Importance: important events tend to be better recalled than unimportant events.
• Reasons: – Importance related to level of overt/covert
rehearsal
– Important event have more “structural” support – elaboration, organization
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Organization of AM
Organization of AM
Why understanding organization is important?
– directs/facilities search/retrieval through AM
– reflects encoding/post-encoding processing
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Hierarchical Organization
Life Periods• temporally limited, thematically defined, concurrent• High school years, Turkey period, PhD years…
Event Clusters/General Events • personal narratives, mini-histories, event sequences,
generic/repeated events
• My trip to Japan, my Candidacy Exam story, breakfasts…
Individual Events
Note: many levels of nesting possible:subsub-eventsubeventevent
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Conway’s Model
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Conway’s Self Memory System (SMS) Model
– Life-time period:
– represents general knowledge about characteristics of a period
– when I was at university, high school.
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Conway’s Self Memory System (SMS) Model
– General events:
– associated events linked by a common theme (e.g., my trip to Toronto), or repeated events (my breakfasts).
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Conway’s Self Memory System (SMS) Model
- Event-specific knowledge:
- sensory-perceptual episodic memories (e.g.,car accident when returning from Toronto).
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Conway’s SMS Model:An Example of a Retrieval Process
• Cue-word: Computer– “Thinking about the times when I was at the
university” (life-time period)
– “I am thinking of my first year IntroPsych classes (general events)
– “the computer was broken in the middle of the experiment I took part last week (ESK)
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An Alternative Organization (Schank; Reiser)
Activity-based Organization
• Event memories associated w/ activity concepts they embody.
• Retrieval:– start with event-type
and specify additional features.
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Horizontal Organization
Horizontal organization = event-to-event links
Horizontal links, often assumed, but little studied.
Issues:
• Do event-to-event links exist?
• How are events linked horizontally?
• How are links created/maintained?
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Horizontal Organization: Two General Positions
Special Narrative Processing Position
• created ONLY by narrative processing given to important life stories
Matter-of-Course Position
• normal memory processing
• higher-level cognitive processing– planning, evaluation, comprehension
• narration
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Studying Event-to-event Organization
Existing Methods
Word & phase cueing and diaries• fundamental problem: data for single events only
“tell me a story” method
• fundamental problems: selection bias, schema-driven reconstruction.
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Studying Event-to-event Organization
Nonetheless, intuition, tell-me-a-story studies indicate:
• Event memories often part of larger narratives
Issues:• Determine “event cluster” prevalence • Understand clustering process(es)
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Studying E-to-E Organization: Event-cueingBrown & Schopflocher (1998)
General Method:
Cueing event: auto event1 [E1]
Cued event: auto event2 [E2]
Assumption:
E1 & E2 often associated
Implication:
pattern of E1 E2 relations reflects underlying organization
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Brown & Schopflocher (1998)
Two groups (during Phase 1 only):word-cued groupimportant-event group
Five Phases:1. generate cueing events2. event-cueing task3. relations-coding task4. event-dating task5. Importance-rating task
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Phase 1Important-Events Condition
• E1 acquisition: Prompt event1 [E1]
• task: to recall important personal event
• (e.g., my mom and telling me that my dad was going to move out)
• 14 trials
• Retrieval time was measured
• Memories (E1s) were typed
• 72 undergrads
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Phase 1Word-Cue Condition
• E1 acquisition: Cue word event1 [E1]
• task: to recall a personal event related to the cue word
• CAR when I was 15, I stole a car.
• 14 nouns
• Retrieval time was measured
• Memories (E1s) were typed
• 73 undergrads
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Phase 2Event-cueing Task
• Identical for both important-events and word-cue conditions
• E2 acquisition: event1 [E1] event2 [E2]
• My mom and dad telling me my dad was going to move out [E1] Dad leaving a note on my pillow saying bye [E2] .
• All E1s served as cues
• Retrieval time was measured
• Memories (E2s) were typed
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Sample Responses: Word-Cued Condition
4 2 1 1 letter this reminds me of the first letter I wrote to my best friend in Toronto• 4 2 1 1 letter When she wrote back telling me that she was returning to Edmonton• 4 2 2 0 book • 4 2 2 0 book • 4 2 3 1 flower When I bought my mother flowers for one of her birthdays• 4 2 3 1 flower I remember the huge hug I received in return from my mother• 4 2 4 1 game The first game I ever received was Monopoly on Christmas• 4 2 4 1 game I remember winning the first time I played it against my brother.• 4 2 5 1 dollar I think of the 20 dollar bill I found on my way to school• 4 2 5 1 dollar I remember going to the store and buying a month's supply of candy (grade 4)• 4 2 6 1 river I think of the barbeque my family had beside the river in China in 1993• 4 2 6 1 river I remember barbecuing fish by the river which tasted okay.• 4 2 7 1 machine when my dad bought me my first typewriter• 4 2 7 1 machine I remember when I kept everyone awake while typing in the middle of the night• 4 2 8 1 dog When I got bitten by a dog on my way to school in grade 1• 4 2 8 1 dog I remember that day was the first time I was absent for school• 4 2 9 1 picture I think of the time my family got our portraits taken in 88• 4 2 9 1 picture I remember in 3/4 of the proofs, my eyes were either half or fully closed• 4 2 10 1 car When I finally got my first car on my 18th birthday• 4 2 10 1 car I remember emptying out my bank account to pay for half of the cost.• 4 2 11 1 hand When I glued my hands together during my first experience with Crazy Glue• 4 2 11 1 hand I was trying to glue back my mother's statue that I accidently broke• 4 2 12 1 window When my thumb got smashed while closing the window very quickly• 4 2 12 1 window I remember my thumbnail turning a hideous black color and falling off.• 4 2 13 1 tree When I crashed into a tree during tobogganing with my friend• 4 2 13 1 tree I remember the huge ugly bruises on my legs afterwards• 4 2 14 1 box I think about the first jewerly box I got from aunt on 7th birthday• 4 2 14 1 box I remember the necklace she gave me along with the box
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Phase 3Relation-Coding Task
• Identical for both important-events and word-cue conditions
• [E1 & E2] + Relation Menu Select relation(s)
• All event pairs scored
• Unrestricted selection
• Untimed
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Phase 3Relation-Coding Task
• Event A: My mom and dad telling me my dad was going to move out.
• Event B: Dad leaving a note on my pillow saying bye– Did event A and B involve the same person or persons?– Did event A and B involve the same activity?– Did event A and B involve the same location?– Did one of the events cause the other?– Is one of the events part of the other?– Are both events part of a single broader event?– Are event A and event B related in some other way?
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Phase 4Event Dating Task
• Identical for both conditions
• Ex Date for Ex
• My mom and dad was telling me my dad was going to move out June 30, 1986
• All events dated
• Random presentation
• Untimed
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Phase 5Importance Rating Task
• Identical for both conditions
• Ex Importance rating for Ex (1-to-5 scale)
• My mom and dad was telling me my dad was going to move out 5
• All events rated
• Random presentation
• Untimed
Psyco 350 Lec #18– Slide 39
Horizontal Organization: Two General Positions
Special Narrative Processing Position
• created ONLY by narrative processing given to important life stories
Matter-of-Course Position
• normal memory processing
• higher-level cognitive processing– planning, evaluation, comprehension
• narration
Psyco 350 Lec #18– Slide 40
Competing Predictions
Narrative Position:
• Only important events will frequently cue cluster mates.
Matter-of-course Position:
• Important and unimportant events will frequently cue cluster mates
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B&S Results: Event Age
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B&S: Results
Defining clustered Pairs:• Clustered Pairs:
– Either cause, subevent, or "same story" relation indicated.
• Nonclustered Pairs:– Neither cause, subevent, nor "same story" relation
indicated.
% Clustered:
• Important-Events Group: 81%
• Word-Cued Group: 75%
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B&S Results: Clustering & Importance
Cueing Event Importance
1 2 3 4 5
Pe
rce
nta
ge
of
Clu
ste
red
Pa
irs
0
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Important-Events Group Word-Cued Group
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B&S Results: Clustered vs Nonclustered Pairs
Median Time(sec) to Retrieve Cued event (E2)
important-event
word-cued
clustered 6.8 6.6
nonclustered 8.4 8.2
important-event
word-cued
clustered 2.0 1.0
nonclustered 210.5 319.5
Median Difference(Days) between Cueing (E1) & Cued Event (E2)
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B&S Results: Clustered vs Nonclustered Pairs
Interevent Relations as a Function of Clustering
Same
Person
Same Location
Same
Activity
Other
clustered 54% 52% 39% 16%
nonclustered 44% 33% 32% 32%
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Summary
Main Claims:• Event clusters very common• Clustered events:
– causally & thematically related– temporally proximate
Evidence:• 80% clustered• RT: clustered < nonclustered• Age s: clustered << nonclustered• Overlapping story elements:
– clustered > nonclustered
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Interpreting Event Clusters
• A Strong Narrative Position
• Event clusters are narratives.
• Narrative processes necessary for creation/ maintenance of autobiographical memory.
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Interpreting Event Clusters
• A Comprise Position
• Clustering prompted by:– temporal contiguity– similarity– causal reasoning– goal directed planning and evaluation
• Narrative creation/maintenance facilitated by clustering
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Retrieval Processes in Autobiographical Memory (Uzer, Lee & Brown, 2011)
– Generative retrieval
– Direct retrieval
Generative retrieval has been assumed as a normative form of retrieval
Models of Autobiographical memory (AM) assume two retrieval strategies:
Psyco 350 Lec #18– Slide 50
– Concrete nouns < emotion terms
– Personal periods < common activities
– Common activities < general actions
Introduction
Retrieval processes: Reaction time (RT)
Studies have shown:
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– As an index of effort required to generate appropriate cues
– Generation is easy and fast, when cue accesses to associative links
– Generation is slower and harder, when cue must be reformulated to access to associative links
Introduction
RT differences:
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– RT differences reflect multiple retrieval strategies
– RTs reflect weighted blend of generative and direct retrieval modes
Introduction
Dual Retrieval Strategies Approach:
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• How common are direct and generative retrieval?
• Would retrieval strategy change as a function of task conditions (e.g., the types of cues provided)?
• Would RT differences still occur holding retrieval strategy constant?
Current Questions
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40 U of A undergraduate students
Within-subjects design
Procedure: Cue word : “specific personal event that is related to the cue word”
Two types of cue words:– Concrete nouns (e.g., chair, pencil, book)
– Emotion terms (e.g., shy, happy, sad)
Exp 1: Method
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Concurrent verbal protocols:“Think out loud by verbalizing all your thoughts as you are thinking them”
Pressing SPACEBAR as memory is retrieved (RT)
Strategy Report: Participants were asked if the memory came directly into mind - “Y” for YES or “N” for NOBrief written report of memory
Exp 1: Method
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Exp 1: Results
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Exp 1: Method
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Exp 1: Method
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Exp 1: Method
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Concurrent verbal protocols: Reactivity to generative retrieval
“Did this memory came immediately to mind” might create a demand for directly retrieved memories.
Exp 1: Issues
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300 U of A undergraduate students
Procedure: Cue-words ---- AM (Identical to Exp 1.)
Pressing SPACEBAR as memory is retrieved (RT)
Exp 2: Method
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Strategy Report:
Cond. 1 (Direct): “Did the memory come immediately to mind” Yes or No responses
Cond. 2 (Generative ) : “Did you actively search to recall this memory?” Yes or No responses
Cond. 3 (Both Option): “How did you retrieve this memory?”
-The memory came immediately to mind
-I actively searched to recall the memory
-I cannot decide between the two options listed above
Exp 2: Method
Psyco 350 Lec #18– Slide 63
Concrete Emotion05
1015202530354045505560
Concrete Emotion05
1015202530354045505560
Direct Ret. Generative Ret.
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Direct Generative
Med
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RT
s (s
ec)
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Direct ConditionGenerative Condition
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Concrete Emotion
Me
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Direct ConditionGenerative Condition
Psyco 350 Lec #18– Slide 66
Concrete Emotion0123456789
10111213
Concrete Emotion0123456789
10111213
Direct Ret. Generative Ret.
Psyco 350 Lec #18– Slide 67
Problems:Participants might be deciding about their retrieval
strategies based on time.
Asking people whether memory directly came to mind or you searched is confounded with time.
When you directly retrieve it is fast when you search it takes time.
Exp 2: Issues
Psyco 350 Lec #18– Slide 68
Another approach: looking at “use of information”.
Direct Retrieval: You don’t use any information to find the memory, the memory comes straight to your mind.
Generative Retrieval: To find the memory you have to search for/use some type of information (e.g., people in your life, any time period, places you have been, etc).
Exp 3: Rationale
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300 U of A undergraduate students
Procedure: Cue-words ---- AM (Identical to Exp 1.)
Pressing SPACEBAR as memory is retrieved (RT)
Exp 3: Method
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Strategy Report:
Condition 1 (Direct Cond.):“This memory was triggered by the cue word so I did not have to use information about my life to help me recall this memory.” Yes or No responses
Yes: Direct Retrieval
Exp 3: Method
Psyco 350 Lec #18– Slide 71
Strategy Report:
Condition 2 (Generative Cond.) : “This memory wasn’t triggered by the cue word so I had to use information about my life to help me recall this memory.” Yes or No responses
Yes: Generative Retrieval
Exp 3: Method
Psyco 350 Lec #18– Slide 72Concrete Emotion
05
101520253035404550556065707580
Concrete Emotion05
101520253035404550556065707580
Direct Ret. Generative Ret.
Psyco 350 Lec #18– Slide 73
Concrete Emotion
Me
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Direct ConditionGenerative Condition
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Direct Generative
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Direct ConditionGenerative Condition
Psyco 350 Lec #18– Slide 75
Concrete Emotion0123456789
10111213
Concrete Emotion0123456789
10111213
Direct Ret. Generative Ret.
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Showed the prevalence of direct retrieval in autobiographical memory
Utility of using retrieval strategy and RT measures to interpret RT differences in retrieving autobiographical memories,
Accounted for cue type effect in autobiographical memory retrieval
Significance and Future Questions