On Sun, 28 Mar 2010 09:05:50 -0700, Ken Steele wrote: >Mike Palij wrote: >>So, the question is "Why can't students who spend about >>15-16 weeks with a textbook, presumably reading it and >>taking notes, and preparing for exam on material therein, >>have such a hard time remembering who the author(s) of the >>textbook was?" > >The effect is not limited to textbook authors. I have students who >cannot remember the name of their instructors from a previous >semester.
Wow! Talk about a demonstration of "repression" at work! ;-) But seriously, that is a serious memory failure. But you know, if you ask students what is the funniest or oddest thing a professor has done in class, they would probably be able to tell you even if they don't remember the textbook or the professor's name. Now why can they remember that? Also: On Sun, 28 Mar 2010 09:05:44 -0700, Stuart McKelvie wrote: >Dear Tipsters, >I will answer with two questions: >1. In which direction does the head face on the American quarter - >to your left or to your right as you look at the coin? This is research by Rubin and Kantis (1983) and if one has a copy of Baddeley's (1990) "Human Memory: Theory and Practice" (it has a purple cover :-) a figure containing some of their stimuli is in Figure 2.4, page 24. Ulric Neisser, I think it is in his "Memory Observed" (white spine and back, black and white photo on front ;-) also mentions that there are certain repetitive behaviors such as saying a prayer or, infamously in the U.S., being unable to say the Pledge of Alegiance or sing the National Anthem even though all of these language based activities may have been performed hundred or even thousands of times (contrast this with motor behavior -- would behaviors repeated so often also be so poorly remembered?). These are problems for memory researchers because it shows that mere repetition of verbal materials, even with large amounts of practice, can lead to poor memory (though I believe that this is not always the case). Meaningful encoding should lead to more distinctive memories that are resistant to interference effects but even these do not hold up over time. But one might think that having to read a book, processing it at a meaningful level, and doing other things with it would produce more durable memory. Consider: in graduate school, didn't all of you start to remember articles and textbooks by author's name? The need to cite the author as well as identify the source of one's information (e.g., the statistical test is shown in Hay's "Statistics for the Social Sciences" [the gray book ;-]) probably were inducements for graduate students know how to refer to articles and book by author while undergraduates don't seem to have the same inducement. Why? -Mike Palij New York University [email protected] --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [email protected]. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=1592 or send a blank email to leave-1592-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
