Storing, Retrieving, and an Alternative View 

Several suggestions are made to assist in improving storage of information in long term memory.

1)  Elaboration:  By elaborating on the information to be stored, additional access points are constructed.  If a child is learning about the civil war, access wo information will be improved if the child has many ways to think about the war.  Thus, viewing a video, reading a book, and listening to an actor cover similar information will increase the access points.  Alternatively, the child may write, tell, and demonstrate through action some piece of knowledge, again creating additional access points.

2) Organization: By helping a child organize information, the information becomes more readily retrieved.  This may be because know the child can access the information by entering at any point in the organizational structure and moving to the desired information.

3) Context: Research indicates that information can be most easily recalled within the same context where it was learned.  Therefore, we would anticipate that children might do better on an exam if the exam occurs in the same room where they have learned the information being tested.



Retrieving from Long Term

1) Use logic, cues, and knowledge to reconstruct information.  Many researchers believe that information that is "remembered" is actually a reconstruction of various incomplete parts which are brought together.  Therefore, when a child is having difficulty recalling a specific piece of information, their recall can be aided by using logic to determine portions of the memory.  An example might revolve around a spelling word the child is struggling with.  By recalling some specific rules, the child may be able to write the majority of the word, which then may trigger a complete memory.

2) Reconstruction may be based on incomplete or distorted memories.  The gestalt theorists taught us that humans have a need for closure.  Therefore, if a memory cannot be recalled in its entirety, there may be a tendency for the human brain to complete the missing data by inference, borrowing from another memory, or fantasy.



Forgetting and Long Term

1) Memory may be available indefinately, given the right cues.  As noted earlier, this position remains debatable.  There is evidence to suggest that memories may last forever.  However, others believe that even if the memory remains intact, it will change when it is recalled because the person recalling it is different than they were when the memory was encoded.  Therefore, a pleasant memory of an experience with a friend may become tinged with hostility and suspicion if it is recalled shortly after a fight.



An alternative model is the level of processing model.  This model focuses on the "depth" at which information is processed.  Therefore, this theory suggests that information a student teaches to another student is better learned because it must be processed at a deeper level than when it is simply read from a book.  Depth is connected to analysis of information and connections made to other information.  By connecting the hypothesized structures of the human brain to a computer, the structures must be considered at a deeper level and are therefore likely to be remembered longer.

One problem with this approach is that "depth" is a very difficult concept to quantify and measure.
 


 

 

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