Long-term Memory

– Barsalou (1988) interviewed undergrads for specific
autobiographical events from the summer
• only 21% of recollections were specific
• the rest were “summarized events” (e.g., “I went to the beach
everyday”)
– Brewer (1988) used beepers to test randomly
selected events
• Linton studied the most important events of the day instead
of the ability to recollect any particular event within the day
• at random times (~2 hours), participants were alerted by a
beeper and would write down:
– location, time, actions, and thoughts
– also a number of ratings
» how often this event occurred
» how pleasant
» how trivial or significant
– he also had them write down the most memorable event of
each day