Elizabeth DiRico
COLL-118
December 6th, 2015
The Complexities of Memory
In order to accurately define a concept as immense and complex as memory, there are many compounding aspects that must be understood. This was the idea behind the memory panel, an interdisciplinary approach at defining the physiological, historical and literary spheres of memory in order to better understand memory as a whole.
First, Professor of psychology Elizabeth D. Casserly began by defining long term memory as a network on interconnected pictures, experiences, and associated concepts. Although memory is stored in and often associated with the hippocampus, memory lives throughout the brain, and therefore memory in robust. To illustrate, the sensory receptor portion of brain can detect a smell and can trigger memories of past experiences of that smell as well as associated images. Memory retrieval is equally as complicated and is influenced by your current state for example you remember the dentist better when your lying down because it triggers the memory of lying down in the dentists chair. Additionally, Memory is also shaped by your current mental state, that is to say if your in a bad mood your more likely to remember something in a negative light, which could differ from your actually mental perception at the time on the event. However memory is often unreliable because we misconstrue information but store it all the same rendering the human mind incapable of differentiation false perception from reality . This was illustrated in a study called The Apple of The Minds Eye where only 1 out of 85 participants were able to correctly re-create the apple logo despite all 85 participants thinking they knew it.
Aaron Seider, Ph.D. professor of history at the college of the Holy Cross looked at how the ancient Greeks view memory as it was accounted in ancient archives. In the ancient story, a man is attending a celebration but when he steps outside the building housing the celebration collapses. In order to recount who was inside, he describes closing his eyes and visually recreating the celebration in his mind, he is then able to walk around and see the faces of those lost in the disaster. This story is a representation of the way ancient Romans perceived memory. This idea of being able to visually recreate a scene and tap into the special memory region in the original memory palace and continues to influence metacognition.
Similarly, Dario A Euraque also discussed how time and space tied into memory when he presented the literary context of memory thought the writing of historians during the time of Nazi Germany. The historians recounted to horror of the past but were unable to act to change their future. This concept ties together the fluidity of historical events and memory as the medium of past experience that dictates the direction of the future and is anchored in the present.
Overall the memory panel broadened my perception of my own metacognition by deepening my understanding of the interworking of memory. Memory is an intricate tapestry weaving together experiences, emotions and perceptions. To truly grasp memory we must view it in its many relevant contexts and not just from a biological standpoint.
