Hockenbury Discovering Psychology 5th txtbk

240 CHAPTER 6 Memoryprocedural memoryCategory of long-term memory thatincludes memories of different skills,operations, and actions.episodic memoryCategory of long-term memory thatincludes memories of particular events.semantic memoryCategory of long-term memory thatincludes memories of general knowledge,concepts, facts, and names.Types of Information Stored inLong-Term Memory A memorableskateboard rideinvolves all three types of longtermmemory. Rememberinghow to steer and balance on askateboard are examples ofprocedural memory. Knowingthe names of the different partsof a skateboard and the differentkinds of skateboards availablewould be examples ofsemantic memory. And, if thisyoung man forms a vivid memoryof the day he rode his skateboardin a huge drainpipe, itwill be an example of anepisodic memory.• Relate the new material to information you already know, searching for connectionsthat make the new information more meaningful.• Generate your own examples of the concept, especially examples from your ownexperiences.At the end of the chapter, in Enhancing Well-Being with Psychology, we’ll give youmore suggestions for strategies you can use to improve your memory.Types of Information in Long-Term MemoryThere are three major categories of information stored in long-term memory(Tulving, 1985, 2002). Procedural memory refers to the long-term memory ofhow to perform different skills, operations, and actions. Typing, riding a bike, running,and making scrambled eggs are all examples of procedural information storedin long-term memory. We begin forming procedural memories early in life when welearn to walk, talk, feed ourselves, and so on.Often, we can’t recall exactly when or how we learned procedural information.And usually it’s difficult to describe procedural memories in words. For example, tryto describe precisely and exactly what you do when you blow-dry your hair, play theguitar, or ride a bicycle. A particular skill may be easy to demonstrate but very difficultto describe.In contrast to procedural memory, episodic memory refers to your long-termmemory of specific events or episodes, including the time and place that they occurred(Tulving, 2002). Your memory of attending a friend’s wedding or your firstday at college would both be examples of episodic memories. Closely related toepisodic memory is autobiographical memory, which refers to the events of yourlife—your personal life history (Nelson & Fivush, 2004). Autobiographical memoryplays a key role in your sense of self.Does culture affect autobiographicalmemory? In the Culture and HumanBehavior box, we examine the impact ofculture on people’s earliest memories.The third category of long-termmemory is semantic memory—generalknowledge that includes facts, names,definitions, concepts, and ideas. Semanticmemory represents your personalencyclopedia of accumulated data andtrivia stored in your long-term memory.Typically, you store semantic memoriesin long-term memory without rememberingwhen or where you originally acquiredthe information. For example,can you remember when or where youlearned that there are different timezones across the United States? Orwhen you learned that there are nine inningsin a baseball game?Implicit and Explicit MemoryTwo Dimensions of Long-Term MemoryStudies with patients who have suffered different types of amnesia as a result ofdamage to particular brain areas have led memory researchers to recognize thatlong-term memory is not a simple, unitary system. Instead, long-term memory appearsto be composed of separate but interacting subsystems and abilities (Slotnick& Schacter, 2007).