Mary B. Howes - Human Memory: A Constructivist View

This book is intended for the upper-level undergraduate, graduate student, or professional researcher in the field of memory. It summarizes research on a number of fundamental areas of memory and attempts to reexamine these areas through the lens of constructivism, which, simply stated, is the idea that memory content is altered by our cognitions and knowledge of the world.

The constructivist approach to understanding memory phenomena is not new to psychology. Indeed, constructivism is considered to have emerged in psychological research from Sir Frederick Bartletts pioneering studies of memory for prose passages in the early 20th century, and later, to have found representation in Piagets studies of memory development in children.

In more recent times, constructivism has enjoyed a renaissance across a number of subfields of memory research. Examples of this include Elizabeth Loftus research on eyewitness memory, Marigold Lintons work on the organization of autobiographical memory, and Roger Schanks theories of the operation of long-term memory. This constructivist renaissance has also spread to a number of other fields dealing with memory phenomena such as criminal justice, history, and education. Thus, because we live in an era where constructivism provides an important foundation to our inquiries into the nature of memory, it is, perhaps, appropriate that constructivism be used as a guiding principle in a memory textbook.

Constructivist interpretation can be applied to two memory processes: encoding and retrieval. When discussing these two dimensions of memory in the classroom, it seems that students have a better grasp of the retrieval process as opposed to encoding. Reflecting this trend, the book moves from discussing retrieval and theories for its operation in the early chapters to discussions of how constructivism affects the encoding processes in the later chapters.

In . Thus, the early chapters introduce the reader to the fundamental idea that information stored in memory has spatial and temporal properties and that the principles of constructivism operate within this spatial-temporal domain.

traces the roots of constructivism in memory research, focusing on the aforementioned seminal contributions of Bartlett and Piaget.

Memory is, perhaps, one of the most personal attributes an individual possesses. It orients a person in time by providing a way to view their past, understand their present, and conceive of their future. More importantly, memory makes possible meaningful connections with others by enabling us to make sense of and share our experiences. explores this more personal side of human memory, and details the role that the mechanisms described in constructivism play in interpreting and organizing our autobiographical memories. The chapter uses some examples of personal memories to illustrate the issues that arise when personal recollection operates on constructivist principles.

Schemas, the building blocks of memory reconstruction, represent how past experiences play a role in creating memories of the present. Although schemas have been implicated in the formation of inaccurate memories, an alternative view is that schemas help to organize and strengthen memory content. builds on this understanding of schemas and examines the schema-induced changes that can alter episodic memory content, with particular emphasis on the theories of Roger Schank and Elizabeth Loftus.

Retrieval of memory content is, essentially, a decision-making process involving the use of an array of cognitive tools, chiefly among which is inference. A memory system operating on constructivist principles would, presumably, rely on inference during retrieval. In

Through also includes discussion on the role played by the amygdala in modulating how we process emotions.

Constructivist thought goes beyond being simply a way to understand how memory functions. Indeed, its principles propose a basis for understanding our capacity for higher-order thinking. , image and motor schemas provide a bridge to the development of conceptual thought in infants. Thus, a constructivist view of memory is, ultimately, about how memory and thought are deeply intertwined and together, enable us to discover the nature of who we are.

Mary Howes became terminally ill during the writing of this book and unfortunately, was unable to see this book through to publication. Fortunately, she provided clear instructions for the remaining parts and I was able to complete what she had begun. The ideas in the book are Marys and are based on a long career of teaching, research, and thinking about the field of memory research so that this book began, in a sense, many years ago. Her previous academic books, The Psychology of Human Cognition: Mainstream and Genevan Approaches and Human Memory: Structures and Images, laid the groundwork for this current book. Mary and I were colleagues at the State University of New York, College at Oneonta and I worked with her on supplemental materials for Human Memory: Structures and Images, so I was very honored that she entrusted me with the completion of what was her final academic book.