Test  PSYCH456

My heart sunk when I read the chapter on “Everyday Memory and Memory Errors” in Goldstein’s text, Cognitive Psychology.  Goldstein states that given we know memories can be created by suggestion, it is easy to see how someone could be subject to the creation of a false memory for abuse (Goldstein, 233).  I think we all wonder sometimes if memories from our childhoods are completely accurate or somehow influenced by the stories told to us by our relatives.  I know for a fact that my parent’s recall of events and my recall are not even close.  Mostly, these memories are not critical or vital to my well-being.  However, there is one particular event that occurred in my wife’s family that speaks to the importance of psychologists understanding memory and its suggestibility.

One of my wife’s relatives was struggling with drug abuse and delinquency during her young adulthood.  She started seeing a therapist who fell into the category of trauma-memory oriented therapy.  These therapists tell their patients that memories of abuse can be buried in the subconscious and usually suggests some visualization exercises to help unlock the lost memory.  This relative in her twenties with the help of her therapist remembered that her uncle had sexually molested her.  She told her mother who thus told her sister that her daughter had accused her husband of molesting her when she was a teen.  This came as a shock to the entire family and made little sense given there was no evidence to support such a claim.  No criminal charges were filed, however, the woman’s mother felt she had to side with her daughter, and the mother’s sister defended her husband.  The sisters, who were once very close, no longer speak to each other.  The family was literally torn in two.  The impact of the allegation was devastating to many people, and to this day, no one knows the truth.

Further emphasizing the importance that memory is suggestible, Goldstein points out there is no test or procedure that can accurately differentiate between real and false memories (Goldstein, 233).  Dr. Elizabeth F. Loftus from the University of Washington has done much research in the area of implanting false memories.  She states, first, there are social demands on an individual to remember which could be pressure from a therapist or researcher, and then, second, memory construction by imagining events is encouraged, and then, finally, the person may be encouraged not to think about whether their constructions are real or not (Loftus, 1997).  Another danger of knowing that false memories of childhood abuse can be implanted in adults is that people who have been actually abused may not be believed which could further the trauma of the actual abuse.

Another aspect of the suggestibility of memory is imagination inflation.  Loftus speaks of the imagination inflation effect.  The act of imagination makes events seem more familiar and when the source of information is especially distant such as a childhood experience, the likelihood of misremembering is high (Loftus, 1997).  Goldstein discusses research that supports the notion that people commit memory errors due to familiarity quite frequently (Goldstein, 2011).  One can easily imagine the more you told your story of abuse, the easier it would become to believe it.

Memory is suggestible, and it is incredibly important for psychologists to understand this concept.  Questions that need to be addressed by future research include what types of people are susceptible to memory suggestibility and are there ways to tell if someone is remembering an actual event or false memory.

References

Goldstein, E. B. (2011). Cognitive Psychology. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning.

Loftus, Elizabeth F. (1997). Creating False Memories. Scientific American, 277(3). Retrieved from https://faculty.washington.edu/eloftus/Articles/sciam.htm

As our book states, “emotions are more often associated with events that are more easily remembered” (Goldstein, 2011). I definitely agree with that statement. I can recall stories when I have had a strong emotional connection to them. For example, when I changed my majored for the third and final time to Psychology it was quite the experience. My family was very disappointed and I went through a lot of self-doubt and depression because lack of support amongst other obstacles. Remembering that time often can bring back certain feelings of loneliness and nervousness. When I retell the story now, those vivid emotions help me recall a lot of the details about this era in my life.

 
Furthermore the book also mentions that as time pass some individuals become more confident in details of events that happened long ago even though more error in their descriptions occurs. I find this amusing and interesting. It is interesting to me because people are so confident in the abilities of their minds. It is exciting to know that people have such strong faith in their memories. On the other hand, I find it funny because people are so confident that they do not come to realize that our brains do not work as effectively as we age (after a certain point). A lot of our systems slow down, so why wouldn’t our brains do the same?Although I am only 22 I know that my brain does not work the same. I have a difficult time remembering what I had for breakfast a few days ago, so I am well aware that I cannot fully recall all the right details for events that happens years ago.

The human mind is fascinating, yet a tricky thing to master. Understanding our brains and knowing its abilities can help individuals like myself effectively use it without overconfidence and inaccuracy.

 
Goldstein, E. (2011). Cognitive psychology: Connecting mind, research, and everyday experience (3rd ed.). Australia: Wadsworth Cengage Learning.

Permanent Flashbulb Memories?

Melanie L. Newby

Remembering any horrific events or situation in life is very weary and dreadful. Especially, at times where you allow your mind to wander and reflect on the events. As well as doing something that you were doing at the time you got that unwanted, disturbing phone call or terrible news. Millions of people around the world reflect on traumatic events, an example would be 9/11. “Any memory for circumstances surrounding and hearing about shocking, highly charge events. It has been claimed that such memories are particularly vivid and accurate,” is known to be flashbulb memories, (Goldstein,B. (2011) Cognitive Psychology. Chapter 8). Just take one moment to think back on that time. What were you doing during that time period? How did you hear about it? Think about those who received the news about one or many of their family members and how they felt at the time. Either way you think about it is a very touchy topic. Flashbulb memories are said to be like a “photograph based on individuals descriptions of what they remembered about the events,” (Cognitive Psychology, p.29).

However, according to Brown and Kulik’s “Now Print” proposal stating that flashbulbs are nothing like photographs. So with that being said, is it possible that when given a chance to talk and recall tragic events, the memory can be fabricated and unlikely permanent? Well, they proposed flashbulb events fades overtime, unlike photographs that remain the same for many years. BUT, how is it possible to forget memories (details) like 9/11 and or what you were doing that time? Well, according to the text, flashbulb memories are no different from everyday memories. Details can fade away. The results from Talarico and Rubins (2003) flashbulb memory experiment. “The decrease in the numbers of details remembered was similar for memories like 9/11 and for memories of an everyday event. Yet, participants belief  that their memory was accurate remained high for 9/11, but decreased for memories of the everyday event. So, is there really difference between everyday memories and flashbulb memories? Are flashbulb memories permanent? From my understanding flashbulb memories can fade away like a normal memory. However, something or maybe a person may trigger flashbulb memory like seeing the date or time (9:11;9/11) or hearing someone talking about it. Flashbulb memories are indeed permanent. You are always going to remember the death of someone or what the horrific situation may be. That is, if you do not choose to block the memory out.

References:

Goldstein,B. (2011) Cognitive Psychology. Chapter 8

Tyffany Hicks
Extra Credit Blog Post
Decision Making

Every day we make decisions based on their level of benefit to us. The Utility theory of decision making best describes how simple to the most complex decisions are made on a simple scale of beneficial versus inconvenient levels. I can relate to this theory because I demonstrate the usefulness of its principles all the time.
For example, when I am deciding which route to drive when I am commuting back and forth from Maryland to Pennsylvania. I may look at the distance of each route is. Also, I take into account how many turns or stops I would have to take. As well, the time of the commute determines the amount of traffic I may come across.
The more number of factors like turns, stops, or higher distance the higher the score and less likely I will choose that particular route. When it comes to time it is more like a likert scale. Where times during most traffic receive a negative score and times during little to no traffic receive no score. All of these factors are given negative values in my mind and the lowest sum will give me the best route to take. Almost like a game of golf. The lowest score wins.
I understand my explanation of the theory was a bit different from the original storyline. However, even with my twist I am still using the same principles. I am still assigning different factors in different scenarios values. To find my solution I sum the factors up and make a decision based on the best score.
Although, I genuinely do relate to the Utility theory I wonder if it can be further generalized or readjusted to a diverse population of decision making people. I wonder is my readjustment of the principles as valid as the original ones? Maybe research one day may give a bit more insight on my inquiry.

References:

Click to access DecisionMaking.pdf

Recently, my husband sent me a text message with a picture of his seven year old cousin, Austin’s homework assignment. It reminded me of one of those funny posts you would see on Facebook titled something along the lines of “Kids say the darndest things… on their homework.” He missed the last question, and you can read why:

I got quite a chuckle out of this, but then it made me think. Although Austin’s answer was very witty, I don’t think he meant it quite that way. I think Austin experienced an incomplete or incorrect representation. He misunderstood the teacher’s wording, and would probably have answered better had the teacher said “Which place helped you decide: tens or ones?”

What the teacher was actually asking him was to explain a portion of the problem space within the problem solving process. As discussed within our lesson notes, problem space represents every possible state of affairs within a problem(Cardenas, “Problem Space”). The teacher wanted Austin to identify this portion of the problem space.

Even after we tried explaining to Austin what he did wrong, he still thinks his answer was justified, because when it comes to math, he just knows everything, or so he says!

Cardenas, R. (n.d.). Retrieved May 6, 2015, from https://courses.worldcampus.psu.edu/sp15/psych256/003/content/14_lesson/09_page.html

Memories are a wonderful thing. As we get older, our lives get busier and certain friendships end we will always have the memories of the good old days. Our ability to remember certain memories weakens over time. We can picture major experiences like  passing your driver’s test, graduating high school/ college, and the birth of a child, with ease but other less important images and information become harder to recall. Forgetfullness is not something to worry about. We all experience the inability to remember someone’s name or where we placed our keys however with age these slips can become more frequent and harder to overcome. If you notice these changes in anyone or even yourself it may be time to seek medical attention.

Having a family member or friend that whose memory is slowly diminishing is difficult to bear. You spend your days trying to help them regain who they once were. They may remember little fragments but as time goes on it will just get worse. Scientists are discovering foods and exercises that will help us strengthen our brains. Lumosity is one of the many websites that has developed tests that are as fun and simple as games. These games are similar to the tests you take for an impact test after you have received a concussion. The impact tests monitors your scores over time and determines if your brain is functioning at the rate it was before. The impact test may seem like a waste of time but I believe that it is important because we can tell ourselves and others that we feel better but if our scores do not correlate with what we are telling people then it tells our doctor or trainer that we need more time to relax.

An awkward situation I’m sure we’ve all had experience with.  Being at an important company function, network meeting or just gathering with friends, we meet people for the second time and they call you by your first name but you’re drawing a complete blank.  We all know it’s rude to forget people’s names but as hard as we try to remember, it just doesn’t stick in our mind.  From the time I could remember, I’ve always had a really hard time remembering names.  My least favorite activity is when people stand in a circle to introduce themselves and then having to repeat all the names before them.  Of course, there were always people that are very good at it and I’ve just wondered why I couldn’t do it.  Later on in life I went into the sale and service industry which required people skills and part of establishing good relationship is remembering people’s names.  So I had to seek help, thankfully a work associate shared a method with me which changed my life forever.  He suggested that the first thing to do it to repeat the name out loud after the person introduce themselves.  Next, pick out a trait, facial feature or characteristics of the person and associate the name with that.  Visual imagery by itself is not maximally effective. To make visual association effective, your imagery must both be “visual” and involve “association.” The two items you are associating should be pictured as interacting in some way with each other. (Higbee) At first I was skeptical but decided to give it a shot.  I formed vivid pictures in my mind, linked it to the name and repeated several times.  To my surprise, it was faster for me to retrieve the information that way.  Creating a strong mental image can help create retrieval cues that allow us to access the information.  After taking this course, I realize that was the method of loci, which is a method that helps us relate to things we want to remember by connecting it with imagery.  I realized I am a visual spatial learner and found that using imagery not just with names but in day to day life really helps me remember things.

Higbee, L.K. (1977) ” Your Memory: How It Works and How to Improve It” Da Cap Press

I always am wondering about the world around me. Human curiosity  can be a dangerous thing.  It is with deductive reasoning that it gets a little safer. We can argue our points with logic and observe from a safe distance.

The sun is normally 9,941 degrees Fahrenheit.

Humans burn at 1,100 degrees Fahrenheit.

Therefore, all humans would burn on the sun.

Deductive reasoning has saved us the death trip to the sun to safely reason that we would die on the sun. Deductive reasoning is going from general to specific concepts. It helps a lot during my work. I have to make sure people know what to do and if not I have to find ways to make them understand. I have found that new workers in my business like to use inductive reasoning to make their assumptions about the work they are doing. I have to explain why this is not a good way to do it, generally they use stereotypes and are not true in the work-field.

Last week I had a new trainee I was working with. I was training her to be a IMS and she thought that it was going to be less work because she heard some of the stockers who were promoted to IMS say it was “much better than stocking.” She took this as her job would be easier. This is not true. IMS deal with more issues than stockers do. They have to deal with the IMS system, pick all the picks per night for every isle/area, Bin all the overstock, make mobile bins, audit bins, and rework what should have gone up. The IMS’ job far succeeds the role of the general shelf stock and because she was using the availability heuristic and inductive reasoning she did not realize her job would be far more difficult and time consuming.

When workers start out off thinking with inductive reasoning it makes it harder to teach them what they need to know. It takes time for them to understand the best or fastest way of getting their job done and when they start of thinking it is easy because people around them said they enjoyed it more, it makes it twice as difficult to make them understand. I told her her general duties and she thought I was crazy stating that others said it was better. To which I told her the self stocker role is easier because they can remember where their items go on the self, they do have to deal with as many responsibility as IMS do and that is the major difference. Picks need to be brought out so we can continually rotate our stock instead of just putting all the overstock into the back where it won’t sell. The IMS are more important because of this.

In general Inductive reasoning can be bad for a workplace. When your workplace has to be in tip top shape and perform at its best, deductive reasoning is more useful because we can find out what is truly happening.

Like many people, when I think about psychology I envision a person resting on a sofa talking to a psychologist. However, psychology is so much more. It impacts our lives on a daily basis. Companies spend billions of dollars to influence the behavior of consumers. In fact, a particular approach of psychology known as behaviorism is very effective at influencing consumer’s behavior. In this approach, a stimulus-response could explain why people act a certain way or modify their behavior. No introspection is needed, only observable and objective elements matter (Goldstein, 2011). For example, yesterday I was thirsty and went to CVS to get a soda. Why did I choose CVS in particular? There are dozens of stores that have soda. Some are even more convenient. However, there was no way I was not going to CVS. A behaviorist technique called operant conditioning was responsible for influencing my behavior.

Operant conditioning is a learning process involving the changing of voluntary behavior. The target behavior is modified by the increase or decrease of positive or negative reinforcements each time the behavior is expressed (Goldstein, 2011). The subject begins to link the pleasure or displeasure of the reinforcement with the targeted behavior. This technique is one of the most common practices of retailers such as CVS. The company’s goal is to make you one of their frequent shoppers by modifying your behavior.

In my case, it is pretty clear that operant conditioning was the method that influence my behavior to buy the soda from CVS. It all started with a previous stop at the CVS store. At that stop, a cashier suggested that I enroll into their frequent shopper program. I did sign up and received a barcoded tag to put on my key chain. The cashier scanned my tag while she checked my items out. She then handed me a receipt which included a discount for Pepsi-Cola. She explained that the more I shopped at CVS, the bigger the discount I would receive. So yesterday when I went to buy the Pepsi, I knew I was going to CVS because they were giving me a discount. In addition, the more money I spend at CVS the bigger the discount.

You see, CVS influenced my behavior by targeting my shopping habits using discounts on their products. They used positive reinforcement (the discounts) to modify my shopping habits (the behavior). Every time I shop at CVS, I receive the discounts. So the association between shopping (behavior) and discounts (positive reinforcement) is exhibited every time I shop there. This is what led me to buy the Pepsi. I am now a frequent shopper at CVS. This is the desired behavior that CVS was trying to develop.

In closing, operant conditioning is an effective method that companies use to modify a person’s shopping behavior. This is just one of the ways that psychology impacts us on a daily basis. So, is the CVS operant conditioning conspiracy true or false? You be the judge.

reference:

Goldstein, E. (2011) Cognitive Psychology: Connecting Mind, Research, And Everyday Experience Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Cengage Learning