Alexis Hayes
Professor Wede
October 13, 2021
Psychology Class
Blog 2 Discussion
Something that I struggle with is long-term memory loss. Long-term memory loss is how your brain keeps information stored. (Long Term Memory Loss, What You Need To Know.) We use our long-term memory to know what is going on around us. (Penn State, Chapter 7.) What can prevent from restoring new long-term memories is damage to the hippocampus. (Areas of The Brain, Penn State) Another area of the brain that is impacted is the medial temporal lobe which has to do with long-term memory. There are signs if someone has long-term memory loss. They repeat the same questions, misplacing items often, have personality changes, and cannot keep up with everyday tasks. (15 signs that your memory may be severe.) It can also be forgetting important dates and forgetting a person’s name. (Long Term Memory Loss.)
The hippocampus is connected to the temporal lobe and is responsible for making long-term emotional memories. If the brain damage is severe, it can make them forget old memories. (Temporal Lobe Damage.) The hippocampus can shrink about to 20% according to some researchers. (What happens if the hippocampus is affected by illness or injury.) There are different health issues that cause long-term memory loss such as depression, PTSD, drug/alcohol use, brain tumors, and a stroke. (What causes long-term memory loss.)
Some memory loss health issues are dementia, Alzheimer’s, and frontotemporal dementia. Dementia is long-term and short-term memory loss and gets worse over time and affects some elderly. (Is It Dementia?) Alzheimer’s affects the elderly and impairs language, memory, and judgment. (Alzheimer’s disease.) Frontotemporal dementia affects some younger people and causes personality changes and memory loss. It is important for people to not diagnose themselves online and to go to the doctor and get diagnosed that if something is going on with them.
Some of the treatments for long-term memory are medications, surgery, exercise, a healthy sleep schedule that can prevent memory loss. (Treatment For Long-Term Memory Loss.) I struggle with long-term memory loss because I forget where I place my items, I forget a person’s name and I ask the same questions repeatedly. The hippocampus and medial temporal lobe are affected if a person long term memory is damaged. Recovery is possible if a person is going through this by exercising, having a healthy sleep schedule, and medication. In conclusion, it is important for people to exercise their brain and take care of their brain by sleeping normally and eating healthy and this fact can prevent brain damage.
Work Cited Page
Admin, E. R. U. K. (2017, June 7). The hippocampus: What is it?: Epilepsy research UK. Epilepsy Research UK iCal. Retrieved October 14, 2021, from https://epilepsyresearch.org.uk/the-hippocampus-what-is-it/.
Hersh, E. (2018, November 27). Long-term memory loss: Causes, symptoms, treatment, and more. Healthline. Retrieved October 14, 2021, from https://www.healthline.com/health/long-term-memory-loss.
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. (n.d.). Memory, forgetfulness, and aging: What’s normal and what’s not? National Institute on Aging. Retrieved October 14, 2021, from https://www.nia.nih.gov/health/memory-forgetfulness-and-aging-whats-normal-and-whats-not.
Alban, P. (n.d.). Why your memory is bad and what to do about it. Be Brain Fit. Retrieved October 14, 2021, from https://bebrainfit.com/bad-memory/.
Working Memory and Depression
Your blog post regarding one cause of Long-Term Memory loss – depression – inspired me to research the connection with Working Memory and depression. The Working Memory is complex and made up of four components. We have read that the Working Memory is located in the prefrontal cortex (and in many other areas of the brain), which controls emotional response (Lesson 5: Short-Term and Working Memory: Working Memory and the Brain).
Disturbances in mental health can inhibit the uptake of information in the Working Memory and how that information is perceived and processed cognitively. People who have suffered depression can usually tell you about specific symptoms – inability to make decisions, no interest in carrying out a simple or a difficult task, failure to concentrate on a task (and, as quoted in our Penn State notes “… controlling attention and switching tasks or goals”), plus zero feeling of accomplishment when a task is completed (Lesson 5: Short-Term and Working Memory, Working Memory and the Brain). They also report confusion and memory disturbances. In today’s world we are required to absorb vast amounts of communications from a wide variety of devices. Naturally, this input is subject to interpretation, and in some individuals, there is an inclination to retain and dwell on negative detail in preference to positive. The psychiatric disorder of depression interferes with cognitive functioning, and consequently, Working Memory (Lesson 5: Short-Term and Working Memory, Working Memory and the Brain; Goldstein, 126-129, 212-217; Levens and Gotlib, 2010).
The contents of our Working Memory are perpetually under review – we take in new data constantly which is shuffled and processed with what is already in the Working Memory. Existing contents of the Working Memory undergo alteration when new material comes in. Less threatening new entries into Working Memory will need less processing, resulting in less storage, if any, in Long-Term Memory. However, what happens to the Working Memory when arresting and disturbing emotional information is taken in and is mixed and changed with Long-Term Memory to reshape Working Memory? It is likely that the negative troubling input will stick around longer, ruminating within Long-Term Memory. Under these circumstances, the Working Memory’s updating process can stall. The inability to adapt to negative input in Working Memory and engage with more positive thoughts can result in a downward spiral of depression. When depressed people receive a build-up of bad news, they have difficulty ridding themselves of these thoughts and transposing them with positive ones (Goldstein, 212-217; Levens and Gotlib, 2010).
In 2010, Sara M Levens and Ian H Gotlib of Stanford University carried out an empirical study and experiment to investigate how both depressed and “never-disordered” participants updated information in Working Memory (Levens and Gotlib, 2010). Their experiment gave results that imply that depressed people are less able to capture and process positive input into Working Memory and to keep it there, and the mechanism to absorb more positive information is blocked. Depressed individuals can dwell on the bad news that is already in Working Memory and reject positive information. This perpetuates their existing negative thoughts. Therefore, any previous resilience depressed people may have had, is, during severe depression, significantly impaired. This would indicate that Working Memory in depressed patients becomes temporarily hindered in its processing function of taking in new positive information. It is also likely that negative experiences will eventually magnify in Long-Term Memory, and that some individuals are predisposed to negative stimuli (Levens and Gotlib, 2010).
Works Cited –
Goldstein, B. (2015). Cognitive Psychology: Connecting mind, research, and everyday experience (4th ed., pp. 122, 131-133, 126-129, 212-217). Stamford, CT: Cengage Learning.
Lesson 9: Everyday memory and memory Errors: Emotions and Flashbulb Memories. (n.d.). In Penn State World Campus. Retrieved October 30, 2021, from https://psu.instructure.com/courses/2130474/modules/items/33027125
Lesson 5: Short-Term and Working Memory: Modal Model of Memory. (n.d.). In Penn State World Campus. Retrieved October 30, 2021, from https://psu.instructure.com/courses/2130474/modules/items/33027082
Lesson 5: Short-Term and Working Memory: Short-Term Memory (STM). (n.d.). In Penn State World Campus. Retrieved October 30, 2021, from https://psu.instructure.com/courses/2130474/modules/items/33027084
Lesson 5: Short-Term and Working Memory: Working Memory and the brain. (n.d.). In Penn State World Campus. Retrieved October 30, 2021, from https://psu.instructure.com/courses/2130474/modules/items/33027090
Lesson 5: Short-Term and Working Memory: Working Memory Components. (n.d.). In Penn State World Campus. Retrieved October 30, 2021, from https://psu.instructure.com/courses/2130474/modules/items/33027089
Lesson 5: Short-Term and Working Memory: Working Memory. (n.d.). In Penn State World Campus. Retrieved October 30, 2021, from https://psu.instructure.com/courses/2130474/modules/items/33027087
Levens, S. M., & Gotlib, I. H. (2010). Updating positive and negative stimuli in working memory in depression. In American Psychological Association. Retrieved October 30, 2021, from https://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/features/xge-139-4-654.pdf