Long Term Memory - Permanent memory (Psychology)

     Information is encoded and rehearsed and transferred from Short Term Memory (STM) to Long Term Memory (LTM) and placed in one of several types of memory systems:


sensory memory  -   the senses momentarily register amazing details.


short term memory -  a few items are both noticed and encoded.

long term storage - some items are altered or lost.

encoding failure/retrieval failure/repression.
   Retrieval from LTM   - depending on interference, retrieval cues, moods and motives, some things get retrieved and some don't.

     As an example the French language learned beforehand interferes proactivity.  Study French and study Spanish ______>PROACTIVE interference.  Spanish learned afterward interferes RETROACTIVITY.

   Episodes - people, places, times and declarative memory for general knowledge, facts, social customs, meaning of words - called Semantic memory.  Thus, there is episodic memory and semantic memory as part of the declarative memory system.

  There is the non-declarative or Procedural memory for habits and skills.  In procedural memory one learns how to do something rather than recollect something.  Much of the processing for doing takes place through unconscious learning as part of procedural memory.  There is:
a.  Motor memory -  the memory of doing such things as driving a car and talking to someone at the same time.
b.  Perceptual memory -  the ability to reconstruct in mind the features of something or the frequency or order of occurrence or location of something.

c.  Classical conditioning - a type of associative learning and memory of what has been learned largely taking place unconsciously.

                                                      Types of LTM

explicit (declarative) with conscious recall            implicit (non-declarative) without conscious recall

                           /             /                                                       /                                    /

facts, general knowledge   personally experienced                    skills, motor,              dispositions-classical  
(semantic theory)            events (episodic memory)                 cognitive                    and operant
                                                                                                                                conditioning effects

CONFUCIANISM – CHILDREN AND PARENTS

CONFUCIANISM – CHILDREN AND PARENTS

                                          By Silva Redigonda

          The parent and child relationship varies from family to family.  This essay will depict the parent and child relationship according to Confucianism.  This view will be compared to that of the Roman Catholic Church.   Finally, a theological reflection will be provided as it pertains to the parent and child from this writer’s perspective.

     Confucius was born around 551 B.C. in what is now Shantung province.  At the age of three Confucius’ father died and he was raised by his mother.  That Confucius was raised by a single parent and found himself in “a not too successful marriage” in his twenties is significant because Confucius placed great importance on the family.[1]  Confucius’ approach to love was that it extended outwards, although less intensely, from the family center.[2]   

     Confucius believed that there are five basic constant relationships and that specific relationships are each different and reciprocal.  These are referred to “The Five Constant Relationships,” one being those between parent and child.  “Parents should be loving, children reverential” (Smith, pp 175-176).  Confucius expected one to serve his parents as he would expect his children to serve him[3].   A list of expectations of the child’s duty towards his parents is from warming the bed for the parent to how a son should specifically stand (Novak, p.121).

     Confucianism ideal of a relationship between child and parent appears specific and rigid.  Yet this can be compared to the Roman Catholic translation of the fourth Commandment.

     The fourth Commandment is explicit to honoring one’s parents.  Here too there is a reciprocality of a child’s expectation toward a parent and a parent toward a child.  Grown children are responsible towards their parents. “As much as they can, they must give them material and moral support in old age.”  There is a list of duties for children as there are for parents, “Parents must regard their children as children of God and respect them as human persons.”[4]  Unlike Confucianism it is not taken to the extreme to the point of how a child stands but the time of Confucianism and the interpretation of the commandment is of separate eras.  There is a clear similarity though not all Catholics may understand this.  For many the commandment is not taken reciprocal.  The belief is that children should honor the parents and not vice versa.  Confucianism, however, is very clear, certainly because Confucius was an educator.

     Catholicism and Confucianism both have strong positive values when it concerns the family unit.  Both are reciprocal.  Both seem clearly guided.  Both are of another time.  How does this apply in our modern era?  What does this raise for me?

     If all people carried the basic principal of honoring each other as parent and child our world would be reasonably better off.  Both religions clearly understand the importance of such close relations and the associated responsibility.  However, children are too often exploited by one or both parents.  It is far too common for a child to be physically or sexually abused by a parent who is entrusted to care for the child.  Children also physically abuse their parents, rob them and in today’s society abandon them by ignoring them, in a world they find too busy.  There is also the parent child relationship that is wonderful, aspiring, spiritual and warm.  This is life.  I think that there is a need of guidance for parents and children to promote a healthy relationship.  Total obedience may not be practical or justified when a child is abused.  The child needs to break away from that silence.  This has significance to me as a counsellor.  Too often, counsellors do not want to deal with a child because of the complications such as having to report cases of abuse.  After recently attending a seminar and learning that a counsellor may see a child without the parent’s knowledge as long as the child is competent in the counselor’s opinion makes it a lot easier for me to report the parent.  In the past, when I revealed that I would have to report any type of abuse, the parent would not permit me to see the child again.  I have learned.  A child is not property.  A child is a human being that should be afforded protection.  The limitation of the readings is that a child is expected to behave for the parent without exception.  There is a denial that a parent is unsuitable. 

     There are so many different types of relationships with children and parents.  Some are healthy and others are not.  Parents do not require a degree to raise children and perhaps they do not have enough resources to learn.  Others inspire a child to grow into a healthy human being.   I marvel in church when I hear a priest guiding a parent to be loving toward a child and vice versa.  I cringe when I hear that the parent is to be honored and it is left with parent and child to take it literally.             

     I think of how my own parents who formed me and provided me with a template to become who I am today.  Confucius realized the importance of guidance for a parent towards his child and a child towards his parents.  Our Catholic tradition does as well. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY

     Catechism Of The Catholic Church.  Publication Service, Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops: Ottawa, 1994.    

     Novak, Philip.  The World’s Wisdom. Sacred Texts of the World’s Religons. Harper Collins: New York, 1994.     

     Rodrigues Hillary and Robinson Thomas, World Religions. A guide to the Essentials. Peabody, Massachusetts.: Hendrickson Publishers, 2006.

     Smith, Huston. The World Religions. 50^th Anniversary Edition. Harper Collins: New York, 1991.

    

---

[1] Smith, Huston. The World Religions. 50^th Anniversary Edition. Harper Collins: New York, 1991. Pp 154-155.  Further references to the text will be indicated by the author’s name and page number. 

[2] Rodrigues Hillary, and  Robinson, Thomas. World Religions. A guide to the Essentials. Peabody, Massachusetts.: Hendrickson Publishers, 2006. P 267.

[3] Novak, Philip.  The World’s Wisdom. Sacred Texts of the World’s Religons. Harper Collins: New York, 1994. P 127.  Further reference to the text will be indicated by the author’s name and page number.

[4] Catechism Of The Catholic Church.  Publication Service, Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops: Ottawa, 1994. P pp 456-457.

Short Term Memory cont.

Short term memory (working, conscience memory) - a short term storehouse for information that has been transferred and encoded from sensory memory.  What one is conscience of is the short term memory (STM).  Miller's work (in the 1950's and 1960's) demonstrated that STM is limited in storage and lasts only as long as one rehearses the information.  Through strategies of organizing or chuncking information, one can retain seven plus or minus two chunks.  Rehearsal or conscious repetition keeps memory from being forgotten. 

A bit of me

It is the weekend once again and plans have been thwarted because of a death.  I shall be with family.  I will be writing about grief eventually, but not today.  I have started writing  my "Memory" notes which I hope some of you will read.  It is ironic that I am writing about memory as it applies to psychology, as I am retrieving my own memory codes to write my second book.  I had always planned to write this one away from the city.  My dream was to write, where I was away at some mysterious cottage near the water with no distractions (except a nearby cafe, by the water).  But, life gets in the way.  Since studying so much these last years and working, I realize that this spring will be my lightest weight since my first retirement.  I am enjoying this period as I take pause.  I should be focused to sell my first book more actively, but I am a novice and I still have another plan for that.  I will find some post box where I can perhaps have people send me some funds and then I can mail it out to them where ever they are.  Maybe I will get lucky.  I am positive.  I wrote that one for fun and the reaction was quite interesting.  Some felt I was telling men what to do, others thought I was great and others hated me.  I don't know why I was surprised.  I wrote it with fun and humour and just looked at it, from my perspective.  We all have our own perspectives and we react accordingly.  I will eventually be posting some short reports on transference and counter-transference.  I studied this, regarding how it pertains to clients, but like everything else that we study or live, we can utilize it across different fields.  So, I should have known better and not have been surprised by the reactions that I received.  I was playing in the form of a book, that took me two months to write and to finally discover how hard it is to publish a book and have an income as a novice.  This second book is different.  I have to retrieve my memory, look at notes and journals and pause.  It is from my soul.  It is, I am discovering, looking at my younger self and wanting to protect her.  This one will sell, I presume because it is about history and growth.  I have gone back in time and as I write, I have become the young woman, that I once was.  I write each morning and then I do all the other things one does in life. 
     I encourage everyone to live one's dreams, as I have lived mine, and continue to do so.  We go through different stages (as you are getting a sense of by my blogs or/and your own knowledge) and we are provided with different roadways.  Which road do you take?  Can you take it?  I remember a psychologist professor, telling us that we may not be able to make a client happy, but we will be able to do is make them less sad and their life more manageable.  Why not take a moment again this weekend to examine your life.  Are you happy?  Why not?  Is there something you can do to change that?    What is it that you can change, that can help you accomplish that?     Are you with people who are making you miserable?  Why are you keeping yourself in that position?  Are you in an abusive relationship?  Do you have an escape plan?  (I will help you with that as well, later).  Remember that balance is important.  You need that time for yourself.  You need to nurture yourself.  Have a nice weekend and do something for fun if you can.     

To what extent can psychology shed light on memory with age?

Memory:  a complex dynamic system of information registration, manipulation, storage and retrieval.  Human memory may be studied from two perspectives:
 Information processing perspective (IP) and biological perspective (BP)

IP - studies mental operations involved in remembering.  Mental Operations are functions involved between the perception of information and its use.  IP studies the changes that take place  within and across individuals with age in IP activities.


external events > sensory memory  - as pay more attention encoding > short term memory > encoding.

Reasons for forgetting 1.  Encoding failure leads to forgetting.  2.  Retrieval failure leads to forgetting. 3.  Repression - Long Term - not conscience;  Short Term - conscious/ working memory.

> Long term memory (same reasons for forgetting apply).

Assumptions of IP approach:  Humans are active--they seek and manipulate information.  Humans can work with a limited amount of information on the conscious level.  Humans transform information into storageable units to be retrieved later.

Processes in IP application  1.  Encoding involves labelling information or attaching a code to it so it can be filed and retrieved, eg. names of relatives, friends, places I have visited et.....Encoding involves arranging information; creating mental associations.  Older adults can through instruction improve encoding skills.

2. Storage -  Place material into a file.  However, material may decay and need to be reconstructed on the basis of memory traces of the experience to be remembered.

There are three types of Memory Storage.  Sensory memory involves registration of sights, sounds, smells and is a temporary memory.  Echoic memory exists for sounds and iconic memory for sights.  This memory declines little with age.  Sperling in the 1960's showed that one's sensory memory for visual stimuli is a complete record of the stimulus and with proper cuing one can recall several items immediately after the initial presentation of the stimulus.

to be continued .........    

Mental Health, cont..psychology notes-b. Behavioral Models and c.

Behavioral Models:  Here the individual has an active role in relation to managing environmental demands. Coping involves learned adaptations.  Successful adaptations lead to stress-reduction and the strategies used become part of the behavioral repertoire for coping with stress.  If escape, avoidance or active coping with a stressor is not successful, the individual may learn to endure the stressor and adapt through learned helplessness.

c.  Coping Style Models:

    Fairly stable styles that emphasize thoughts and attitudes as variables in coping - Coping here is a form of problem solving.  For example Valliant (1970's) identified four kinds of adaptive mechanisms or characteristic ways of coping -  mature, neurotic, immature and psychotic. 
     Those who used mature mechanisms were healthier and happier.  For Lazarus coping is struggle not success, managment not mastery.

Cognitive- Appraisal Model:  Coping occurs in situations that a person perceives as taxing and requiring effort.  People choose a strategy depending on their cognitive appraisal of the situation.  Because the situation is constantly changing, coping is a dynamic process.  Choosing the most appropriate strategy requires constant re-apprisal of the situation.

Note two modes of coping
1.  Emotion focused is directed toward feeling better - managing emotional responses.
2.  Problem focused is directed toward eliminating, managing or improving a stressful condition. 

With God In Russia (book review)

 With God in Russia by Walter J. Ciszek, S.J.     Silva Redigonda

     With God in Russia is about a young Jesuit priest who suffers twenty-three years in Soviet prisons and Siberian Labor Camps under suspicion of being a spy for the Vatican. It portrays a loss of innocence from sufferings endured and seen.  But more importantly it tells a journey of his relationship with God who helped him throughout this ordeal of pain.

     Father Ciszek's story begins in 1939. His journey is taking place at a time when millions died, a Great War was fought, the hydrogen bomb was invented, and four Popes reigned, which covers much of the 19^th century.  The author restricts opinions but rather allows the reader to form them.  The author manages to provoke thought and incorporates much of the images of the 19^th century political and religious arena.  Pieces of information is received from the author and transcended to the reader to allow reflection for the time period between his life in confinement and the outside world.

          The central idea is how cruel people can be to each other.  This is manifested by how suspicious people can become of the Catholic Church.  The most important theme is how God is with us everywhere making life bearable when it isn't. It shows humanity at its worse and at its best.  Cruelty is demonstrated by beatings, torturing, and killings occurring within the camps and among the prisoners themselves.  The reader travels along with Father Ciszek and feels the escalation of his hunger, his pain, and the omissions of the basics of human needs such as water and food. Soap is a luxury. It shows humanity at its best by the kindness still evident by some to help others at the risk of their own safety.  It shows God's guiding hand in helping Father Ciszek to serve mass; listen to confession when possible and keeping him alive.  The author successfully portrays the hypocrisy of communism by the contrast of power.  It illustrates beatings of Father Ciszek, as he insists that he is not a spy.  It depicts how a priest must be silent of who he is when religion is considered an evil. Father Ciszek is very convincing in portraying his life objectively.  There is goodness in those imprisoned for murder, within the guards and within the medical profession.  Father Ciszek permits us to see as he sees humanity, the balance of goodness and evil, the misinterpretations that occur as being suspect of the religious, even among good men.              

   There are two metaphors in the biography, which brings everything together politically, and display a balance of good/evil in humanity.  The first is the image of a Pope shaking hands with a Russian leader at the same time that priests and nuns are imprisoned and treated poorly.  The second, which is also the climax of the story, is portrayed when Father Ciszek is walking along with other prisoners, after Stalin's death where they are being transferred to be shortly released from confinement. Father Ciszek observes a mother bird tending to her young chicks and the father bird is watching over the nest.  This image relaxes the priest and fills him with a joy he hasn't experienced for so long.  He reflects on his own relationship with his own father.  Entranced he marvels to a fellow prisoner.  The prisoner grabs a stone and throws it at the mother bird, killing her. The prisoner is quite pleased with his aim, oblivious to the end of life he has caused. Father Ciszek demonstrates his first and only display of anger and disgust. "… I began to shake all over, completely beside myself with rage.  I shouted and raved at him almost irrationally until, stunned; he turned on his heel and walked away.  I spat on the ground behind him in anger.  That night I fell into a mood of depression that lasted for more than two days."  After enduring so much, his moment of joy is destroyed.  It all comes together, the senselessness of it all.

     This book is highly recommended.  Once one begins to read it and become part of Father Ciszek's life, it is difficult to put the book down.  One becomes completely immersed.  This is a book for everyone because it teaches life.  It shows good and bad of everyone.  Even though Father Ciszek suffered greatly, he also depicts the good in Russia, in the people.  By the time you have finished reading Father's Ciszek's book you have fallen in love with him.