I Remember When… :: Biology Essays Research Papers

I Remember When†¦ This paper was written by a student in a course at Bryn Mawr College, and reflects that student's research and thoughts at the time the paper was written. Like other things on Serendip, the paper is not intended to be "authoritative" but is instead provided to encourage others to themselves learn about and think through subjects of interest, and, by providing relevant web links, to serve as a "window" to help them do so. Web links were active as of the time the paper was posted but are not updated. There's a standing joke in our family, or rather between my sister and I. It usually comes up at family get-togethers, about the time that we're all trying to decide what to do, where to go, or what to eat. Mom will say something like, "let's have that spaghetti casserole with turnip greens that I made at last summer's get-together, we all enjoyed it so much." Jackie and I will exchange a look that says, "gross, we hated that," and invariably Mom, seeing the look pass between us, will say in utter seriousness, "no, no. I DISTINCTLY REMEMBER. We all loved that casserole." What continually amuses both Jackie and I, is the degree of confidence with which Mom remembers the same event we do, but so differently. How can people be so certain and yet so mistaken about events in our own histories? And yet, it happens time and again, and not just in my family. The observation that episodic memory retrieval is vulnerable to distortion has been documented thoroughly. Even the pattern of errors can be predicted with some reliability. (1) In order to situate "episodic memory," it's useful to know several distinctions in memory research. The most basic one is between brief and enduring memories, called short-term memories (STM) (or working memory, WM), and long-term memory (LTM). Within LTM, there are qualitative distinctions, such as between explicit and implicit, and declarative and procedural -- both of these distinctions have to do with consciousness about the memory. Explicit/declarative memory encompasses facts, figures, and all of conscious memory. Its what we commonly refer to as memory. (2) This type of memory is flexible, fast, and specialized for one-time learning. (3) Procedural/implicit memory is thought to be the most durable memory, and encompasses learned habits, skills and things that you "know" but don't consciously think about.