Chapter 7 Test

218

Test yourself repeatedly throughout your studies. This will not only help you figure out what you know and don’t know; the testing itself will help you learn and remember the information more effectively thanks to the testing effect.

Question 7.42

1. The psychological terms for taking in information, retaining it, and later getting it back out are _______, _______, and _______.

encoding; storage; retrieval

Question 7.43

2. The concept of working memory

  1. clarifies the idea of short-term memory by focusing on the active processing that occurs in this stage.

  2. splits short-term memory into two substages—sensory memory and working memory.

  3. splits short-term memory into two areas—working (retrievable) memory and inaccessible memory.

  4. clarifies the idea of short-term memory by focusing on space, time, and frequency.

a

Question 7.44

3. Sensory memory may be visual (_______ memory) or auditory (_______ memory).

iconic; echoic

Question 7.45

4. Our short-term memory for new information is limited to about _______ items.

seven

Question 7.46

5. Memory aids that use visual imagery or other organizational devices are called _________.

mnemonics

Question 7.47

6. The hippocampus seems to function as a

  1. temporary processing site for explicit memories.

  2. temporary processing site for implicit memories.

  3. permanent storage area for emotion-based memories.

  4. permanent storage area for iconic and echoic memories.

a

Question 7.48

7. Hippocampus damage typically leaves people unable to learn new facts or recall recent events. However, they may be able to learn new skills, such as riding a bicycle, which is an _______ (explicit/implicit) memory.

implicit

Question 7.49

8. Long-term potentiation (LTP) refers to

  1. emotion-triggered hormonal changes.

  2. the role of the hippocampus in processing explicit memories.

  3. an increase in a cell’s firing potential.

  4. aging people’s potential for learning.

c

Question 7.50

9. A psychologist who asks you to write down as many objects as you can remember having seen a few minutes earlier is testing your _______.

recall

Question 7.51

10. Specific odors, visual images, emotions, or other associations that help us access a memory are examples of _______ _______.

retrieval cues

Question 7.52

11. When you feel sad, why might it help to look at pictures that reawaken some of your best memories?

Memories are stored within a web of many associations, one of which is mood. When you recall happy moments from your past, you deliberately activate these positive links. You may then experience mood-congruent memory and recall other happy moments, which could improve your mood and brighten your interpretation of current events.

Question 7.53

12. When tested immediately after viewing a list of words, people tend to recall the first and last items more readily than those in the middle. When retested after a delay, they are most likely to recall

  1. the first items on the list.

  2. the first and last items on the list.

  3. a few items at random.

  4. the last items on the list.

a

Question 7.54

13. When forgetting is due to encoding failure, information has not been transferred from

  1. the environment into sensory memory.

  2. sensory memory into long-term memory.

  3. long-term memory into short-term memory.

  4. short-term memory into long-term memory.

d

Question 7.55

14. Ebbinghaus’ “forgetting curve” shows that after an initial decline, memory for novel information tends to

  1. increase slightly.

  2. decrease noticeably.

  3. decrease greatly.

  4. level out.

d

Question 7.56

15. The hour before sleep is a good time to memorize information, because going to sleep after learning new material minimizes _______ interference.

retroactive

Question 7.57

16. Freud proposed that painful or unacceptable memories are blocked from consciousness through a mechanism called _______.

repression

Question 7.58

17. One reason false memories form is our tendency to fill in memory gaps with our reasonable guesses and assumptions, sometimes based on misleading information. This tendency is an example of

  1. proactive interference.

  2. the misinformation effect.

  3. retroactive interference.

  4. the forgetting curve.

b

Question 7.59

18. Eliza’s family loves to tell the story of how she “stole the show” as a 2-year-old, dancing at her aunt’s wedding reception. Even though she was so young, Eliza says she can recall the event clearly. How is this possible?

Eliza’s immature hippocampus and lack of verbal skills would have prevented her from encoding an explicit memory of the wedding reception at the age of two. It’s more likely that Eliza learned information (from hearing the story repeatedly) that she eventually constructed into a memory that feels very real.

Question 7.60

19. We may recognize a face at a social gathering but be unable to remember how we know that person. This is an example of _______ _______.

source amnesia

Question 7.61

20. When a situation triggers the feeling that “I’ve been here before,” you are experiencing _______ _______.

déjà vu

219

Question 7.62

21. Children can be accurate eyewitnesses if

  1. interviewers give the children hints about what really happened.

  2. a neutral person asks nonleading questions soon after the event.

  3. the children have a chance to talk with involved adults before the interview.

  4. interviewers use precise technical and medical terms.

b

Question 7.63

22. Psychologists involved in the study of memories of abuse tend to disagree with each other about which of the following statements?

  1. Memories of events that happened before age 4 are not reliable.

  2. We tend to repress extremely upsetting memories.

  3. Memories can be emotionally upsetting.

  4. Sexual abuse happens.

b

Find answers to these questions in Appendix E, in the back of the book.