This volume offers a collection of theoretical perspectives in the area of short-term memory. It contains overviews of models of short-term memory, with particular emphasis placed on the detailed description of the functioning of the models. The volume represents both computational approaches and theories expressed in more traditional verbal form. Models represented in the volume also cover both developmental and neuropsychological perspectives on short-term memory.; This book should appeal to active researchers in the area of memory, to graduate students, and to academics who wish to update their knowledge of this fast- developing are of research and theory. Final year undergraduates may also find this book of interest.

Over the last decade, the topic of prospective memory - the encoding, storage and delayed retrieval of intended actions - has attracted much interest, and this is reflected in a rapidly growing body of literature: 350 scientific articles have been published on this topic since the appearance of the first edited book in 1996. In addition to the quantity, the quality and diversity of approaches to research in the field has also developed rapidly. Prospective Memory provides an accessible, integrated guide to the expanded literature on the topic. While many of the authors also contributed to the 1996 book and can be regarded as the founders of current prospective memory research, other contributions come from authors who are relatively new to the field and who are examining broader aspects of prospective memory and, as a result, extending our understanding of it. Besides more generally reviewing the expanded literature, all authors have been encouraged to consider future directions for research and to raise questions that they believe all researchers in this area will need to address. The book is divided into four sections that together provide a broad and deep introduction to the cognitive, neuroscience, developmental, and applied aspects of prospective memory. Following the model of the first prospective memory volume, prominent memory researchers evaluate the papers in each section and comment more generally on the state of prospective memory research in the four major areas targeted.

Originally published in 1973, this book contains the 1971 William James Lectures at Harvard, the first by that name to be given by a British psychologist. In addition, there are reprints of four shorter lectures which had not been easily available before. Together the resulting collection gave a broad picture of a number of advances in human psychology in the previous ten years. Memory, attention, language, and the processes of decision are discussed, and typical recent ideas and experiments described. Each topic is presented, however, with continual reference to the reasons why the research was done, its implications for philosophy and for scientific method, and its connection with an attitude to politics and life as a whole. The author not only describes little known facts about the way people take decisions or remember, but also argues that we are living through a change in our attitudes to human nature: and that proper concern for human values, or understanding of people with minds different from our own, must demand a more scientific and less intuitive analysis of man. Experiments on human beings still strike many of us as cold-blooded and inhuman; this book tries to explain why some scientists devote themselves to this approach. It makes the connection between measurements of reaction time or of ability to see a written word in a brief flash, and our political and personal beliefs. Donald E. Broadbent is well recognised as a major influence on cognitive psychology today. This reissue is an opportunity to see his exceptional writing in print again and should be read with equal interest by psychologists as well as laymen who would like to know about some of the more practical aspects of psychological enquiry of the time.

How is the complex history of the ancient Near East and Islamic World brought to bear in contemporary political discourse? In this book, Medieval Near Eastern historian Jacob Lassner explores the resonance of ancient and medieval history in the political disputes that dominate the contemporary Middle East. From identification with ancient forbears as a method of legitimization and nation-building, to tracing the deep history of the concept of revolution in the Arab world, the author probes the historical foundations of modern conflicts in the region. A medievalist, the author takes the position that an appreciation of cultural history is essential to understanding the debate surrounding the Israel/Palestine conflict. In turn, the book identifies the misappropriation and misunderstanding of the past, deliberate or accidental, as key weapon in the ongoing conflict.

This book describes the first comprehensive experimental research program on an individual who exhibits exceptional memory. Rajan Mahadevan, the subject of these investigations, won a place in the Guinness Book of Records for reciting pi to 31,811 decimal places, can learn matrices up to size 20 X 20, and can produce memory spans above 60 for digits. Utilizing the methodology and theories of modern cognitive psychology, the authors systematically investigated Rajan's memory skills. A wide range of experiments and tests were conducted with Rajan and four control subjects. These include memory span tests for digits and letters, memory for various kinds of non-numeric information, tests of working memory, learning and retention of numeric matrices, memory and visual searches of the digits of pi, and lexical decision tasks with the digits of pi. The authors describe how they came to understand the way Rajan stored and now retrieves the decimal digits of pi, how he learns and retrieves matrices, and how he encodes and retrieves digits in a memory span task. Although his strategy for memorizing and retrieving digits is unique in the literature on people with extraordinary memory, the authors show how their investigations of Rajan contribute to our understanding of memory.

Originally published in 1978, this seventh volume of an international series continues the objective to increase and disseminate scientific knowledge in the area of human attention, performance and information processing, and to foster international communication in this area. This volume covers the following topics: time in perception; word perception and reading; speech perception and coding; hemisphere differences; response and physiological processes; theories and models. Today it can be read and enjoyed in its historical context.

Research in collective memory is a relatively new area capturing the interest of scholars in social psychology, memory, sociology, and anthropology. The core idea is that collective attitudes and behaviors are created and shared through common experiences and communication among a cohort of people. For example, people born between 1940 and 1960 are often defined via the JFK assassination and the Vietnam War. Their parents typically experienced lesser impact from these events. Papers about collective memory have appeared in the literature under different guises for the last hundred years. Freud's Civilization and Its Discontents, Jung's ideas on the collective unconscious, and McDougall's speculation on the group mind posited that identity and action could be viewed as resulting from the shared development of a culture. Halbwachs, a French social psychologist (1877-1945) who was the first to write in detail about the nature of collective memory, argued that basic memory processes were all social. That is, people remember only those events that they have repeated and elaborated in their discussions with others. In the last several years, there has been a resurgence of interest in this general topic because it addresses some fundamental questions about memory and social processes. Work closely related to these questions deals with the nature of autobiographical memory, traumatic experience and reconstructive memory, and social sharing of memories. This book brings together an international group of researchers who have been empirically studying some basic tenets of collective memory.

The first comprehensive theoretical formulation of the way people use information they receive about their social environments to make judgments and behavioral decisions, this volume focuses on the cognitive processes that underlie the use of social information. These include initial interpretation, the representations used to make inferences, and the transformation of these subjective inferences into overt judgment and behavior. In addition, it specifies the role of affect and emotion in information processing, and the role of self-knowledge at different stages of processing. The theoretical model presented here is the first to provide a conceptual integration of existing theory and research in all phases of social information processing. It not only accounts for the major portion of existing research findings, but permits several hypotheses to be generated concerning phenomena that have not yet been empirically investigated. Although focused here on the processing of information about people and events, the formulation proposed has implications for other domains such as personnel appraisal, political decision making, and consumer behavior.

In this landmark volume from 1976, Robert Crowder presents an organized review of the concepts that guide the study of learning and memory.

The basic organization of the book is theoretical, rather than historical or methodological, and there are four broad sections. The first is on coding in memory, and the relations between memory and vision, audition and speech. The second section focuses on short-term memory. The third is loosely organized around the topic of learning. The final section includes chapters that focus on the process of retrieval, with special attention to recognition and to serial organization.

Crowder presumes no prior knowledge of the subject matter on the part of the reader; technical terms are kept to a minimum, and he makes every effort to introduce them carefully when they first occur. It is suitable for advanced undergraduate and graduate courses.

In this volume, two scholars with different but complementary interests in memory and cognitive development present a careful overview of the field of memory development from the perspective of their theory of good strategy use. In addition to treating broad topics of general interest, such as knowledge, cognitive capacity, and metamemory, the text also examines controversial issues surrounding the development of children's memory--particularly eyewitness memory. The result is a coherent statement about memory development accompanied by commentary on the study of memory development, plus applications of the theory and research in the area. This book is intended for advanced undergraduate and graduate students as well as researchers and other professionals interested in child and adolescent memory.

In this landmark volume from 1976, Robert Crowder presents an organized review of the concepts that guide the study of learning and memory.

The basic organization of the book is theoretical, rather than historical or methodological, and there are four broad sections. The first is on coding in memory, and the relations between memory and vision, audition and speech. The second section focuses on short-term memory. The third is loosely organized around the topic of learning. The final section includes chapters that focus on the process of retrieval, with special attention to recognition and to serial organization.

Crowder presumes no prior knowledge of the subject matter on the part of the reader; technical terms are kept to a minimum, and he makes every effort to introduce them carefully when they first occur. It is suitable for advanced undergraduate and graduate courses.

Control processes are those mental functions that allow us to initiate, monitor, and prioritize mental activities. They are crucial to normal mental functioning. A better understanding of the nature of control processes and their deficits is important for clinical work and for an adequate theory of consciousness. Previously, control processes have been examined within the frameworks of two parallel but independent paradigms: those of cognitive psychology and of neuropsychology. Cognitive psychologists have stressed the theoretical and empirical nature of normal unimpaired control processes; neuropsychologists have focused on the relationships between damage to specific functional areas of the brain and deficits in specific control processes. Both have contributed extensively to our understanding of control processes. However, they have tended to operate independently, with little if any cross-talk between disciplines, despite the potential benefits such dialogue is likely to generate. This book represents the first attempt to synthesize cognitive and neuropsychological perspectives on control processes. It contains state-of-the-art reports on various aspects of control processes by experts from both disciplines.

The rapid growth in the numbers of older people worldwide has led to an equally rapid growth in research on the changes across age in cognitive function, including the processes of moment to moment cognition known as working memory. This book brings together international research leaders who address major questions about how age affects working memory:

• Why is working memory function much better preserved in some people than others?
• In all healthy adults, which aspects of working memory are retained in later years and which aspects start declining in early adulthood?
• Can cognitive training help slow cognitive decline with age?
• How are changes in brain structures, connectivity and activation patterns related to important changes in working memory function?

Impairments of cognition, and particularly of working memory, can be major barriers to independent living. The chapters of this book dispel some popular myths about cognitive ageing, while presenting the state of the science on how and why working memory functions as it does throughout the adult lifespan.

"

Working Memory and Aging" is the first volume to provide an overview of the burgeoning literature on changes in working memory function across healthy and pathological ageing, and it will be of great interest to advanced undergraduates, postgraduates and researchers in psychology and related subject areas concerned with the effects of human ageing, including several areas of medicine.

Ranging historically from the French Revolution to the beginnings of Modernism, this book examines the significance of memory in an era of furious social change. Through an examination of literature, history and science the authors explore the theme of memory as a tool of social progression. This book offers a fresh theoretical understanding of the period and a wealth of empirical material of use to the historian, literature student or social psychologist.

This highly readable foundational text for undergraduates provides an overview of the major theories and research on human memory. Grounded in the premise that all psychological processes depend on memory, and that memory is shaped by how people use it, the authors look at the brain-based memory process and discuss the major theories that have been developed to explain how memory functions.

The book examines memory in everyday life-issues such as memorizing facts, when to perform tasks, and remembering life's events-and addresses such intriguing and controversial topics as repressed and recovered memories, using memory in legal testimony, cases of amnesia, and cases of super-memory. It also describes the effects of remembering traumatic events and explores the myths and realities surrounding memory loss. This text, presented in a manner that is scientifically sound yet entertaining, will serve as a valuable, concise introduction for undergraduate students.

Key Features: Provides a concise, easy-to-read, yet scientifically based survey of theory and current research on memory for undergraduate students Based on the concept that memory is foundational to all psychological processes and human experience Includes the most up-to-date research on memory including findings from neuroscience Covers controversial topics including repressed and recovered memories, memory in legal testimony, amnesia, and cases of super-memory

This volume provides an overview of a relatively neglected branch of connectionism known as localist connectionism. The singling out of localist connectionism is motivated by the fact that some critical modeling strategies have been more readily applied in the development and testing of localist as opposed to distributed connectionist models (models using distributed hidden-unit representations and trained with a particular learning algorithm, typically back-propagation). One major theme emerging from this book is that localist connectionism currently provides an interesting means of evolving from verbal-boxological models of human cognition to computer-implemented algorithmic models. The other central messages conveyed are that the highly delicate issue of model testing, evaluation, and selection must be taken seriously, and that model-builders of the localist connectionist family have already shown exemplary steps in this direction.

The majority of research on eyewitness memory has traditionally studied children and young adults. By contrast, this volume is designed to provide an overview of empirical research on the cognitive, social, and health related factors that impact the accuracy of eyewitness testimony given by the elderly. The book takes a lifespan developmental perspective that incorporates research on witnesses of all ages, but uses the findings to focus on issues unique to the elderly. This includes research on recognition memory with lineup identifications and recall memory that occurs when an elderly witness is asked to describe an event in court. The Elderly Eyewitness also examines jurors' reactions to the testimony of an elderly witness, and the legal and social policy issues that emerge when the elderly witness participate in legal proceedings. While reviewing what is known about the elderly witness, the book also provides a direction for future research into this new frontier of scientific inquiry. Its audience spans researchers in cognitive and developmental psychology, and professionals working in the growing area of psychology and law.

The rapid growth in the numbers of older people worldwide has led to an equally rapid growth in research on the changes across age in cognitive function, including the processes of moment to moment cognition known as working memory. This book brings together international research leaders who address major questions about how age affects working memory:

• Why is working memory function much better preserved in some people than others?
• In all healthy adults, which aspects of working memory are retained in later years and which aspects start declining in early adulthood?
• Can cognitive training help slow cognitive decline with age?
• How are changes in brain structures, connectivity and activation patterns related to important changes in working memory function?

Impairments of cognition, and particularly of working memory, can be major barriers to independent living. The chapters of this book dispel some popular myths about cognitive ageing, while presenting the state of the science on how and why working memory functions as it does throughout the adult lifespan.

"

Working Memory and Aging" is the first volume to provide an overview of the burgeoning literature on changes in working memory function across healthy and pathological ageing, and it will be of great interest to advanced undergraduates, postgraduates and researchers in psychology and related subject areas concerned with the effects of human ageing, including several areas of medicine.

The Foundations of Remembering presents a collection of essays written by top memory scholars in honor of Henry L. Roediger III. The chapters were originally delivered as part of the "Roddyfest" conference held in March 2005 to celebrate Purdue University's awarding of an honorary doctor of letters to Roediger in recognition of his many contributions to the field of psychology. Authors were given a simple charge: choose your own topic, but place your work in historical context. Roediger is fascinated by the intellectual lineage of ideas, so addressing historical "foundations" seemed a fitting tribute. The Chapters contained in this volume help to establish the foundations of remembering, circa the first decade of the 21st century, as perceived by some of the leading memory researchers in the world. Not surprisingly, each of the chapters touches on Roediger's research as well, largely because his work has helped to define and clarify many topics of interest to the memory field. The Foundations of Remembering is intended for a wide audience: students, scholars, and anyone interested in exploring the historical and conceptual roots of modern memory theory.

As one of the most hotly debated topics of the past decade, false memory has attracted the interest of researchers and practitioners in many of psychology's subdisciplines. Real-world issues surrounding the credibility of memories (particularly memories of traumatic events, such as sexual abuse) reported by both children and adults have been at the center of this debate. Were the adults actually retrieving repressed memories under the careful direction of psychotherapists, or were the memories being "created" by repeated suggestion? Were children telling investigators about events that actually happened, or were the interviewing techniques used to get at unpleasant experiences serving to implant memories that eventually became their own? There is evidence in the psychological research literature to support both sides, and the potential impact on individuals, families, and society as a whole has been profound. This book is an attempt to cut through the undergrowth and get at the truth of the "recovered memory/false-memory creation" puzzle. The contributors review seminal work from their own research programs and provide theory and critical evaluation of existing research that is necessary to translate theory into practice. The book will be of great value to basic and applied memory researchers, clinical and social psychologists, and other professionals working within the helping and legal professions.

Originally published in 1974, this volume presents empirical and theoretical investigations of the role of meaning in psychological processes. A theory is proposed for the representation of the meaning of texts, employing ordered lists of propositions. The author explores the adequacy of this representation, with respect to the demands made upon such formulations by logicians and linguists. A sufficiently large number of problems are encompassed by the propositional theory to justify its use in psychological research into memory and language comprehension. A number of different experiments are reported on a wide variety of topics, and these test central portions of this theory, and any that purports to deal with how humans represent meaning. Among the topics discussed are the role of lexical decomposition in comprehension and memory, propositions as the units of recall, and the effects of the number of propositions in a text base upon reading rate and recall. New problems are explored, such as inferential processes during reading, differences in levels of memory for text, and retrieval speed for textual information. On the other hand, a study of retrieval from semantic memory focusses on a problem of much current research. The final review chapter relates the present work to other current research in the area at the time.

Originally published in 1977, the chapters in this volume offer a concise review of the research and new direction in the study of alcohol and cognition at the time. Each chapter has been prepared by an eminent researcher who was currently involved in investigating human cognitive behaviour. The chapters contain not just a dry summary of work done in the field, but descriptions of the impetus for the work that was done, problems in doing such work, knowledge that was gained, and suggestions for future research. Many new approaches are presented for the study of alcohol and memory, and for the understanding of results of studies already done. This was a forward-looking volume not only about directions for future research, but with solid contributions that review and integrate major areas of inquiry on the influence of alcohol on memory and behaviour at the time.

'Someday we expect that computers will be able to keep us informed about the news. People have imagined being able to ask their home computers questions such as "What's going on in the world?"...'. Originally published in 1984, this book is a fascinating look at the world of memory and computers before the internet became the mainstream phenomenon it is today. It looks at the early development of a computer system that could keep us informed in a way that we now take for granted. Presenting a theory of remembering, based on human information processing, it begins to address many of the hard problems implicated in the quest to make computers remember. The book had two purposes in presenting this theory of remembering. First, to be used in implementing intelligent computer systems, including fact retrieval systems and intelligent systems in general. Any intelligent program needs to use and store and use a great deal of knowledge. The strategies and structures in the book were designed to be used for that purpose. Second, the theory attempts to explain how people's memories work and makes predictions about the organization of human memory.

Originally published in 1986, this book was written for undergraduates who had completed an introductory course in psychology, and aimed to acquaint the student with the core of recent experimental findings and theoretical ideas concerning human memory. Each chapter deals with a specific area of memory research but care is taken to build on what has been covered in preceding chapters, so providing an integrated treatment of the subject. Thus, the book can comfortably be read from cover to cover, or selected issues can be referred to in isolation. Important features of the book include discussion of fundamental issues about the nature of the scientific process, the role of models and theories in it, and the historical development of models of human memory. Also, the treatment of 'Forgetting' includes chapters on motivational aspects (psychopathological forgetting, post-hypnotic amnesia, and directed forgetting), and organic amnesia.

Originally published in 1976, this volume contains new and original contributions of the time addressed to a related set of ideas concerning processes of memory in animals. The theme is that animals remember and that theories of animal learning must take this into account as well as the coding processes that have been assumed to be specific to human beings. The focus of the book is on processes, and some progress is reported in differentiating types of memory. The emphasis in applying animal work to studies of human memory is made not in terms of paradigms but in terms of processes implicated via performance in a variety of tasks. Also, many of the chapters reflect the usefulness of applying a memory framework to a variety of "nonmemory" paradigms. This work will be essential reading for all those interested in animal as well as human memory, and provided the most up to date and broadest examination of animal memory processes at the time, from both a theoretical and conceptual framework.