A Year 12 Update – Try not to forget…
Year 12 students should be working on the SAC that is due next Wednesday 25 May.
The documentation relating to the SAC may be downloaded from the Year 12 Downloadable Handouts page. The results of Ms Green’s class’s research activity have also been uploaded (and will be given out in class tomorrow as well). Don’t forget to supply the password.
The powerpoint on Theories of Forgetting may also be downloaded on that page.
An extra exam preparation class will be run after school on Thursday tomorrow, as in the last two weeks. Please go to 217.
By the way, the details of the Unit 3 exam, which looms dangerously close, are available at this link. You can download a file of sample questions and general expectations.
http://www.vcaa.vic.edu.au/vcaa/vce/studies/psychology/psych-samp.pdf
Finally, if you would like to check your memory for basic definitions and terms used in the course, try the flashcard quiz below:
By the way, if you would like to put your revision in your pocket, you can also download flashcards from this site to your chosen gadget, provided that it supports this kind of application. The App I use is called Flashcards and is available through i-Tunes.
New password
We have put a password on the Year 12 Downloadable Handouts page, just to ensure that no personal details or pictures are obtainable on the internet. If you wish to download a handout, the password is the timetable initials of the two year twelve psychology teachers, in alphabetical order and lower case. No spaces.
You are welcome to download the PowerPoint on Models of Memory we have been using in class. If you have a device that allows it, you may be able to view it on your phone or other gadget, as well as on your computer. It is in PDF form and can be printed out with four slides or more to a page, if you wish.
A new science of the mind – lectures by Eric Kandel
Note: Click here to download the Student Work Outline for Memory
“I know what it’s like to be dead.”
– Clive Wearing, a man who suffers from devastating memory dysfunction.
Photo: Hmong woman by Mimi_K, flickr.com
Clive Wearing’s terrible words illustrate the link between the first area of study and the second in Unit 3 Psychology.
It is our ability to create and retrieve memories that allows us to experience what William James called the “stream of consciousness”. This awareness of our ongoing identity, which connects our personal past with our present, despite the physical changes of our existence, despite our moments of forgetfulness, despite altered states of consciousness including dreaming and sleeping, is central to the experience of being both human and alive.
Clive Wearing knows that he has lost something crucial to human life, because he can no longer form new memories. His horrifying loss is one of the case studies referred to by Eric Kandel in the lectures described below. Wearing’s consciousness is purely in the present. Even though he can play the piano with phenomenal skill, he cannot recall having done so a minute or two later. He can no longer connect his past with his present.
Kandel closes this series of lectures by referring to five principles that his lifework allows him to enunciate with the authority of a great scientist:
1. Mind and brain are inseparable.
2. Each mental function of the brain is carried out by separate neural circuits in different regions of the brain.
3. All neural circuits are made up of the same class of signalling units: nerve cells and their synapses.
4. The synapse serves a double function: it is the point of communication between nerve cells, and the site of memory storage.
5. The synapse is also a target for disease in both neurological and psychiatric disorders.
The videos below have been embedded from research.org’s channel on Youtube and provide the first and the last lectures in the four-lecture series. You may prefer to go to the website link below, where you can find links to all four lectures in the series, as presented by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. The website link is:
http://www.hhmi.org/biointeractive/neuroscience/lectures.html
Another option is to download these lectures to your i-pod via i-Tunes. That way you can listen to Kandel and go for a walk as well! To do this, go to the link below and navigate to Podcasts 13 and 16, the neuroscience lectures, number 1 and number 4:
http://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/hhmis-holiday-lectures-on/id214106297?ign-mpt=uo%3D4
These videos will introduce you to the brilliant mind and fascinating discoveries of Kandel, who, through his studies of the Aplysia slug, was able to uncover what happens to neurons in the brain when we learn something new and commit that new knowledge to memory. Though they are in greater depth than you will require for the exam, watching the videos will provide you with an overview of the whole topic of human memory.
The first six videos below are all part of one lecture by Kandel on the history of memory research. These videos are a superb introduction to the topic. Part 1 mainly introduces Kandel; Parts 2-6 form the majority of his lecture. He is a very clear speaker who uses many examples that you will find aid your comprehension:
Part 2 considers the painful life of Clive Wearing and the research into which parts of the brain are involved in memory:
Part 3 touches on the work of Broca and Wernicke, thus providing excellent revision for your studies in first term.
Part 4 of Kandel’s video discusses the development of electrical stimulation of the brain and its use to identify parts of the brain that are involved in specific mental activities, such as facial recognition, sensation in specific parts of the body and memory.
Part 5 continues to consider the question of the localisation of memory within the brain. In this video Kandel describes the importance of the hippocampus in allowing short-term memories to be converted into long-term memories. In particular he discusses the ground-breaking research into the life and brain of HM, now known as Henry Molaison.
In Part 6 Kandel refers to the experiences of Henry Molaison and Clive Wearing, who both tragically suffered terrible memory deficiencies as a result of hippocampus damage. Clive Wearing describes his experience thus: “I know what it’s like to be dead.” Drawing on these two case studies, Kandel explains which kinds of memory are affected by hippocampus damage and which are not.
In the much longer video below, Kandel describes in some depth the studies with slugs and mice that underpin research into the physiological basis of memory. Once again, the depth of this lecture is much greater than you will need for your assessment, but watching the video will provide you with Kandel’s highly lucid explanation of his Nobel Prize winning research.
Holiday homework for Year 12 students
Details of homework to be done: See post below or DOWNLOAD HERE
In case you missed any of the handouts on the last two frenetic days of term, you can download them here:
♦A blank concept map of the Atkinson-Shriffrin Model of Memory for you to fill in:
DOWNLOAD HERE
♦A blank concept map of Craik and Lockhart’s Levels of Processing Model (see handout)
♦A blank concept map of Baddeley-Hitch’s Model of Working Memory:
DOWNLOAD HERE
♦Question and answer sheet on the four theories of forgetting: retrieval failure, motivated forgetting, interference theory and decay theory:
DOWNLOAD HERE
Flashcard quiz on memory for Year 12 Psychology
Dear Year 12 students,
The flashcards below may help you to learn many of the terms you’ll need for the next area of study. You might also find that by going to the site itself, http://www.quizlet.com, you can make up your own sets of flashcards, download them to your i-Pod or i-Phone or simply read them on-line. They can also be printed out or used to generate simple tests.
The more you rehearse, the longer you’ll remember. Of course, if you rehearse meaningfully, you’ll have more chance of the information becoming firmly fixed in your long-term memory, so that you can retrieve it with ease all your life long.
Or at least in the exam.
Kind regards and happy holidays from Ms Ind, Ms Bottrell and Ms Green.
PS Don’t forget to do your holiday homework (download here), which will be handed out later this week:
♦A concept map of the Atkinson-Shriffrin Multi-Store Model of Memory DOWNLOAD HERE
♦A concept map of Craik and Lockhart’s Levels of Processing Model (see handout)
♦A concept map of Baddeley andHitch’s Model of Working Memory DOWNLOAD HERE
♦Question and answer sheet on the four theories of forgetting: retrieval failure, motivated forgetting, interference theory and decay theory DOWNLOAD HERE
◊OUCH.
If you would like to put your revision in your pocket, you can also download flashcards from this site to your chosen gadget, provided that it supports this kind of application. The App I use is called Flashcards and is available through i-Tunes.
Flashcard quiz for Year 11 Psychology
You can download a list of topics for the test on Thursday 10 March at this link.
The little quiz below allows you to read through the definitions that you will need to know for the test. If you click on “Study these flash cards” at the bottom of the box, you will be able to generate a little multiple choice test for yourselves, or other kinds of tests.
You can also click on the link to the Quizlet website (bottom left) if you would like to register and create your own sets of cards. This is recommended for the rest of this year and for year twelve students as well.
Psych Conference News, February 2011
At the conference on Friday we soaked up as much information as possible and did our best to bankrupt our small faculty by ordering mounds of books. We hope to add as many useful resources to this blog as we can. For instance, there is now a brief account of the main points made about the Unit 3 and 4 exams – rules, expectations and latest information. Click below to read this information, which will be updated as often as possible. There is a link on this page to the sample questions that have been supplied for the Unit 3 exam as well. These can be downloaded and should be pored over by every Year 12 student.
Photo: Tawny in the Daytime by Mimi_K at flickr.com