Memory For New Information Research Articles

Downstream Effects of Dispositional Inferences on Confirmation Biases.

Although research has given substantial attention to understanding the antecedents of dispositional inferences, less attention has been directed at the consequences of these inferences, such that evidence linking dispositional inferences to downstream effects is relatively scarce. The present investigation examined whether dispositional inferences formed during initial observations elicited confirmatory processing of subsequent information about observed targets. Because confirmation biases influence a variety of information processing strategies, four experiments examined the extent to which dispositional inferences guided memory of new information (Experiment 1), interpretation of ambiguous information (Experiment 2), and information-seeking behavior (Experiments 3 and 4). Results indicated that biased processing of subsequent information was more likely when dispositional inferences were encouraged (i.e., impression formation objective) versus discouraged (i.e., narrative construction objective). This investigation highlights the role of causal inferences on confirmation biases and reveals the ease with which biases can be both bolstered and attenuated.

Long-Term Memory Updating: The Reset-of-Encoding Hypothesis in List-Method Directed Forgetting.

People’s memory for new information can be enhanced by cuing them to forget older information, as is shown in list-method directed forgetting (LMDF). In this task, people are cued to forget a previously studied list of items (list 1) and to learn a new list of items (list 2) instead. Such cuing typically enhances memory for the list 2 items and reduces memory for the list 1 items, which reflects effective long-term memory updating. This review focuses on the reset-of-encoding (ROE) hypothesis as a theoretical explanation of the list 2 enhancement effect in LMDF. The ROE hypothesis is based on the finding that encoding efficacy typically decreases with number of encoded items and assumes that providing a forget cue after study of some items (e.g., list 1) resets the encoding process and makes encoding of subsequent items (e.g., early list 2 items) as effective as encoding of previously studied (e.g., early list 1) items. The review provides an overview of current evidence for the ROE hypothesis. The evidence arose from recent behavioral, neuroscientific, and modeling studies that examined LMDF on both an item and a list level basis. The findings support the view that ROE plays a critical role for the list 2 enhancement effect in LMDF. Alternative explanations of the effect and the generalizability of ROE to other experimental tasks are discussed.

Hearing Loss in Older Adulthood

Adult aging is accompanied by declines in many areas of cognitive functioning, including reduced memory for new information. Potential sources of these declines are well established and include slowed processing, diminished working-memory capacity, and a reduced ability to inhibit interference. In addition, older adults often experience sensory decline, including decreased hearing acuity for high-frequency sounds and deficits in frequency and temporal resolution. These changes add to the challenge faced by older adults in comprehension and memory for everyday rapid speech. Use of contextual information and added perceptual and cognitive effort can partially offset the deleterious effects of these sensory declines. This may, however, come at a cost to resources that might otherwise be available for “downstream” operations such as encoding the speech content in memory. We argue that future research should focus not only on sensory and cognitive functioning as separate domains but also on the dynamics of their interaction.

Memory for new information as a cognitive marker of liability to Alzheimer's disease in a high risk group: a research note

The development of Alzheimer's disease (AD) is often insidious and there is evidence that pre-morbid neuropsychological deficits exist. To examine aspects of neuropsychological performance as cognitive markers in a group at high risk of developing AD. Memory for novel information and verbal fluency were examined in 33 unaffected biological siblings of patients who fulfilled criteria for probable AD, and 22 controls who reported no family history of dementia. Comparisons between siblings and controls revealed significant differences on overall memory performance. This was also the case when siblings were grouped according to whether or not they possessed the apoE epsilon 4 allele. There were no significant differences between siblings and controls on verbal fluency measures. Detailed measures of memory performance may be clinically useful in groups at a high risk of developing AD. However, further longitudinal research in such high-risk groups is needed before conclusions can be made with confidence.

Quantitative effects of nefiracetam on spatial learning of rats after cerebral embolism

Recent studies have shown that nefiracetam ameliorates cognitive dysfunction because of ischemia when behavioral testing occurs during treatment. We sought to determine if there was a persistent effect after treatment, by testing spatial learning of embolized rats after nefiracetam therapy. Methods: Male Sprague Dawley rats (250 to 300g) were divided into 3 categories. The control group (n = 5) underwent no surgery or cerebral embolism. The vehicle group (n = 12) was anesthetized with halothane, underwent surgery, injected with intracarotid microspheres, and given orally 5mL/kg of the vehicle (0.5% aqueous sodium carboxymethyl cellulose) for 21 days. The nefiracetam group (n = 12) was embolized and treated orally with 30 mg/kg nefiracetam (6mg/mL in vehicle) for 21 days. Outcome was determined with visual spatial learning after the end of treatment. Results: Embolization caused a significant impairment in visual spatial learning, which nefiracetam completely ameliorated (group main effect, F2,444 = 6.4, P =.002). Mean latency to the escape was 35 ± 6 seconds for the vehicle group versus 18 ± 4 seconds for the nefiracetam group, after 4 days of testing. This effect persisted after a further interval of 10 days (retention test). A reversal test (to assess working memory for new information) yielded mean latencies of 26 ± 6 seconds for the control group, 49 ± 5 seconds for vehicle, and 25 ± 4 seconds for nefiracetam (group main effect, F2,109 = 8.0, P =.0005, Newman-Keuls, P <.05), showing that both the control and nefiracetam groups were different from the vehicle group. Conclusion: Nefiracetam therapy improves the learning behavior of embolized rats. The results are not caused by an activating effect of the drug because the animals are tested after the treatment period is over and because the beneficial effect is seen using the delayed retention test. Finally, working memory is markedly preserved by nefiracetam, an effect observed several weeks after treatment. Copyright © 2001 by National Stroke Association

Learning and memory during general anesthesia: an update.

Learning and memory during general anesthesia: an update.

Sublexical components in implicit memory for novel words.

Five experiments investigated the role of sublexical components in implicit memory for novel words. Priming on an implicit word judgement task occurred consistently for nonwords formed out of familiar linguistic components (morphemes and syllables) but minimally for nonwords formed out of unfamiliar pseudosyllabic components. This effect was dissociable from explicit memory and insensitive to changes in the surface features of the stimuli. Moreover, it depended on unitization of stimulus components as opposed to priming of individual components. Results are interpreted in terms of the activation and integration of prior linguistic knowledge and as evidence against the role of new (perceptual or episodic) representations in implicit memory for new information.

Effects of NMDA Modulation in Scopolamine Dementiaa

D-Cycloserine is a partial agonist at the strychnine-insensitive neuronal glycine receptor and positively modulates the N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) excitatory amino acid receptor. NMDA receptors appear to be important in learning and memory, and D-cycloserine facilitates learning in rats. In man, central cholinergic blockade due to scopolamine administration impairs attention, information processing, and memory for new information, the latter secondary memory impairments resembling those shown in patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD). D-Cycloserine has been studied for its ability to counteract the cognitive decrements produced by scopolamine in young and elderly healthy volunteers. D-Cycloserine specifically antagonized the memory impairments produced by scopolamine. These findings provide evidence of NMDA receptor involvement in human memory and suggest a novel mechanism for alleviation of memory loss associated with aging and dementia.

Cognitive psychology and medical diagnosis

AbstractThe nature and acquisition of complex cognitive skills have been intensively investigated over the past 20 years. From such studies in non‐medical domains it appears that experts (a) generally remember new information in their field better than do the less expert; (b) work forward to solutions; (c) form superior representations of problems; (d) are superior in knowledge, not in basic processing abilities; and (e) require extensive practice over a period of years to achieve expert status. Studies of expertise in medical diagnosis have found two major departures from the typical findings in other areas of expertise, viz. that memory for new information seems best at intermediate levels of skill rather than at high levels, and that a mixture of forward and backward reasoning (hypothetico‐deductive inference) is common at all levels of skill in medical diagnosis. These departures from findings in other domains are explained by the special characteristics of both medical knowledge and the diagnostic task.

Nicotine chewing gum (2 mg, 4 mg) and cigarette smoking: comparative effects upon vigilance and heart rate

Sixteen male smokers, abstinent the morning before testing, were assessed under four conditions: placebo chewing gum, 2 mg nicotine chewing gum, 4 mg nicotine gum, and cigarette smoking. Placebo gum was administered in the cigarette condition, while sham smoking occurred in the gum conditions. Pre-drug administration and post-drug difference scores were calculated for each assessment measure: rapid visual information processing (RVIP), memory for new information, and heart rate. Nicotine raised heart rate in a significant monotonic dose-related manner (P less than 0.001): placebo +0.2; 2 mg gum +5.1; 4 mg gum +9.8; cigarette +17.5 bpm. Rapid visual information processing target detections were also significantly related to dose (P less than 0.01), with this increased vigilance significant under 4 mg nicotine gum and cigarette smoking. Memory task performance was not significantly affected. Self-reported feelings of alertness/energy were higher while smoking than under placebo or 4 mg gum. Complaints about the taste of the 4 mg nicotine gum were frequent.

Neurobehavioral Outcome after Gunshot Wounds to the Head in Adult Civilians and Children

To assess the quality of long term outcome of civilian gunshot wounds to the head after intensive neurosurgical management, particularly with regard to the possibility of subtle problems due to diffuse injury, we administered neuropsychological tests to six survivors (four adults and two children) at about 1 year after injury. Five patients were moderately disabled, and one patient achieved a good recovery. Residual neurobehavioral sequelae were present in all cases. Defects in long term memory for new information were the most common sequelae, whereas the persistence of linguistic and visuospatial deficits was related to the hemispheric lateralization of injury. In comparison with the outcome reported for patients with closed head injuries who had similar Glasgow coma scale scores, our patients exhibited more severe impairment due to significant focal brain injuries and less evidence of diffuse damage.

Neurobehavioral outcome after gunshot wounds to the head in adult civilians and children

To assess the quality of long term outcome of civilian gunshot wounds to the head after intensive neurosurgical management. particularly with regard to the possibility of subtle problems due to diffuse injury, we administered neuropsychological tests to six survivors (four adults and two children) at about 1 year after injury. Five patients were moderately disabled, and one patient achieved a good recovery. Residual neurobehavioral sequelae were present in all cases. Defects in long term memory for new information were the most common sequelae, whereas the persistence of linguistic and visuospatial deficits was related to the hemispheric lateralization of injury. In comparison with the outcome reported for patients with closed head injuries who had similar Glasgow coma scale scores, our patients exhibited more severe impairment due to significant focal brain injuries and less evidence of diffuse damage. (Neurosurgery 16:754-758, 1985)

Recall of a 10-word list in the assessment of dementia in the elderly.

SummaryResidents of homes for the elderly with a history of impaired memory compatible with senile Alzheimer dementia were assessed by a paired-associate learning test (PALT) and a word list recall test. The latter discriminated between groups of individuals categorized according to severity of cognitive impairment by the PALT. It may be suitable for the assessment of memory for new information in clinical practice and for the evaluation of change in clinical trials of treatments for dementia.

Effects of prior knowledge on memory for new information

Three experiments examined the effects of prior knowledge on the learning and retention of new information. Subjects learned varying amounts of prior knowledge about individuals referred to by first name/last name combinations. In the first two experiments, subjects more rapidly learned new information about individuals for whom they were given prior knowledge, retrieved this information more slowly, and showed smaller interference (fan) effects. This complex of results is predicted by a spreading activation model in which we assume subjects try to integrate the prior knowledge with the new information in a network fashion. The third experiment, in addition to including conditions of prior vs. no prior experimental knowledge, included well-known names like Ted Kennedy, about which subjects have a great deal of preexperimental prior knowledge. The relationships between conditions of experimental prior knowledge and no prior knowledge obtained in Experiments 1 and 2 were replicated, but the well-known names did not behave simply like the extreme of experimental prior knowledge. In particular, subjects showed the fastest verification of new facts learned about the well-known names, rather than the slowest, as predicted from the spreading activation network model.

Effects of analogy to prior knowledge on memory for new information

Two experiments explored how memory for new information is affected by awareness of parallels to pre-experimental knowledge. In one experiment, subjects studied brief biographies of fictional characters analogous to famous people. Best recognition resulted with the analogous famous person identified at Study and Test; identification at Study or Test alone interfered relative to no identification. A second experiment rejected accounts relying on simple matching between Study and Test contexts: A famous person's name was beneficial only when facts in the biography were true of that famous person. Our data suggest that the benefit of prior knowledge derives from the more elaborate encodings that analogy promotes. Implications for schema and depth-of-processing theories of memory are considered.