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Exploring the Depths of Autobiographical Memory: Insights and Methods

This document examines the complexities of autobiographical memory within the context of various theories and methodologies. It discusses Neisser's foundational works on cognition, the nature of everyday memory, and the importance of autobiographical narratives in shaping personal identity. Key topics include mnemonic techniques, the social aspects of memory recollection, and cognitive processes associated with memory retrieval. Additionally, the text investigates methods of testing autobiographical memory, the structure of personal narratives, and their adaptive functions in human behavior.

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Exploring the Depths of Autobiographical Memory: Insights and Methods

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  1. AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL MEMORY • The “ecological movement” • Neisser’s call: • Cognition and Reality (1976) • Memory Observed (1982) • Banaji & Crowder (1989): Everyday memory is bankrupt • Low generalizability? • Lack of control • No new “principles” • “Applied” studies of memory continue to be popular • Flashbulb memories • Prospective memory • Eyewitness testimony • Traumatic amnesia • Mnemonic techniques; expertise • Autobiographical memory

  2. Memory for One’s Life Story:Content and Process • Biography and Culture • Biography as historical record • Biography as narrative • The “oral history” movement • AM as a social activity • Building and sharing our “life story” • Allende’s Paula (1995) • Socializing, bonding and constructing the “self” through recounting our story • Proust’s In Search of Lost Time (1922) • The importance of cues • Ecphory of the past and present • Memory is life: Rachel the Replicant • The importance of reminiscence among the elderly • Bluck: In search of wisdom • The adaptive functions of AM: fight, flight or flirt?

  3. METHODS OF TESTINGAUTOBIOGRAPHICAL MEMORY • Cuing methods • Free recall (and problem of clustering) • Cued recall • By word or phrase (Galton 1879; Crovitz 1974) • By date • By “life period” • Recognition (and issue of distractors) • How to verify memory? • Experimenters keeping diaries • Linton (75), Wagenaar (86): record events and contexts • Subjects keeping diaries • Brewer (88): random “moments” • Interviews with family members • Repeated testing of individuals

  4. STRUCTURE AND PROCESS IN AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL MEMORY • The forgetting function for AM • Strong recency effect • Quasilinear or power function? • Crovitz & Schiffman, 1974 • Wagenaar, 1986 • Content and cuing variables • Salience and emotionality • Number and type of cuesData from Wagenaar, 1986 • Deviations from the curve • Infantile amnesia and its causes • The “reminiscence bump” 15-25 yrs

  5. Content of AM • AM as composite of episodic (spatiotemporal context) and semantic (personal and factual) information • EM as fleeting, unless “linked” to AM knowledge and context (Conway, 00) • EM (e.g., imagery) critical for cuing • Linked to or part of the “Self” and goal • Importance of self and goal hierarchy in Conway’s recent work • “Constructive” nature • 30% new details, 40% change in those called “distinctive”, over retest (Anderson & Conway, 94) • But also largely accurate • Constraints on errors • Rehearsal and stabilization of stories

  6. Organization of AM • Conway & Rubin’s hierarchical model • Life Periods around Themes • General Events and “minihistories” • Event-specific Knowledge and details

  7. Retrieval of AM • Retrieval as cyclic and effortful • General events the “typical” entry point via cues (cf. Rosch’s Basic Level?) • Top two levels accessed “semantically” • ESK within events accessed chronologically? • Free recall at first faster, then slower, than chronological (Anderson & Conway 93) • The pleasures of remembering • Photos, scrapbooks and diaries

  8. Crovitz & Schiffman, 1974cue-word recall of AM

  9. Wagenaar 1986Diary-based cued recall of AM

  10. Wagenaar 1986AM content and access Functions are Wagenaar’s ratings at time of event, With “`1” the lowest in all cases

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