It is a commonly held belief that people pay more attention during arousing or stressful situations and are less subject to forget. Therefore, those who have experienced a stressful situation will be able to easily and accurately recall even after long periods of time compared to a non-stressful event. While others argue that stress greatly impairs memory. In this paper I will present both sides of this argument and the research behind them and reach a conclusion based on my investigation.
One of the arguments against stress impairing memory is from Sven-Ake Christianson, a researcher, who theorizes that stress does not impact a person’s ability to remember relevant details. He researched ability to remember details in a stressful or non-stressful situation. His theory, based on the results, is that stress in a situation only decreases ability to remember less relevant details. (Christianson)
Researchers against the idea of stress improving ability to recall argue that it is a very common mistake to believe that in high intensity situations the details are burned into your memory. They put forth that these very vivid memories that seem anything but infallible are even more likely to be incorrect or even a false memory. (Lampien, Meier, Arnal, and Leding)
Alafair Burke, Friderike Heuer, and Daniel Reisberg also did a series of experiments testing the ability to remember details in a stressful or neutral situation. There results were also that central details were remembered better than non-central details in a stressful rather than neutral event. Meanwhile in neutral events more non-central details were remembered. They also did a follow-up test a week later. In this second test, fewer of the non-central details were remembered mea...
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... was stopped at the sign, they directly referenced it by asking a question about the color of the sign. In this experiment over half of the students who hadn’t been showed the sign admitted to seeing one. (Schooler, Gerhard, and Loftus)
In addition to explaining one of the side effects of suggestion on memory I believe this illustrates the unloading of the system two thinking at it’s unloading of tasks onto system 1. As well as a possible framing effect.
In conclusion, stress or arousal to a certain degree improve memory and prevent forgetting. However, this applies mainly to main concepts or details and is subject to bias’s which can cause misinformation and lower accuracy of details properly remembered. So details and events heard about stressful situations should be taken with a grain of salt and considered with deep logical thinking instead of with system one.
Stress at the time no doubt affected the victim’s memory of her attacker. When stressed the brain is not at its greatest when it comes to memory formation and retrieval. When the body is stressed it starts to pump adrenal glands like there’s no tomorrow. The trauma by actually being ra...
In the experimental group the middle four average scores were not significantly different (M = 0.70, SD = 0.04) from the last four average scores (M = 0.50, SD = 0.00), t(4) = 2.06, p < ns . In the control group, the middle four average scores were also not significantly different (M = 0.68, SD = 0.02) from the last four average scores (M = 0.56 , SD = 0.00), t(4) = 1.89, p < ns.The serial position curve of recall of the warned group and the control group showed a similar pattern as to the one found in previous studies on the same topic. Both groups were able to recall about 90% of the words in the beginning of the list and the end of the list (See Figure 1). The warned group had slightly more false memories, but the difference was not at all significant (see Figure 2). The control group recalled more critical and studied words than the warned group (see Table
Cognitive symptoms of stress are memory problems. You may tend to forget what your main goal or sometimes even what your purpose is. You may not recall tasks that you were planning to do. You see...
Human memory is flexible and prone to suggestion. “Human memory, while remarkable in many ways, does not operate like a video camera” (Walker, 2013). In fact, human memory is quite the opposite of a video camera; it can be greatly influenced and even often distorted by interactions with its surroundings (Walker, 2013). Memory is separated into three different phases. The first phase is acquisition, which is when information is first entered into memory or the perception of an event (Samaha, 2011). The next phase is retention. Retention is the process of storing information during the period of time between the event and the recollection of a piece of information from that event (Samaha, 2011). The last stage is retrieval. Retrieval is recalling stored information about an event with the purpose of making an identification of a person in that event (Samaha, 2011).
Atkinson, R.C. & Shiffrin, R.M. (1968). Human memory: A proposed system and its control process.
According to Sternberg (1999), memory is the extraction of past experiences for information to be used in the present. The retrieval of memory is essential in every aspect of daily life, whether it is for academics, work or social purposes. However, many often take memory for granted and assume that it can be relied on because of how realistic it appears in the mind. This form of memory is also known as flashbulb memory. (Brown and Kulik, 1977). The question of whether our memory is reliably accurate has been shown to have implications in providing precise details of past events. (The British Psychological Association, 2011). In this essay, I would put forth arguments that human memory, in fact, is not completely reliable in providing accurate depictions of our past experiences. Evidence can be seen in the following two studies that support these arguments by examining episodic memory in humans. The first study is by Loftus and Pickrell (1995) who found that memory can be modified by suggestions. The second study is by Naveh-Benjamin and Craik (1995) who found that there is a predisposition for memory to decline with increasing age.
...pporting details. At the conclusion of the article, the authors share their thoughts on how it might be virtually impossible to determine when a memory is true or false. I also like their willingness to continue the investigations despite how difficult it might be to obtain concrete answers.
Memory is the tool we use to learn and think. We all use memory in our everyday lives. Memory is the mental faculty of retaining and recalling past experiences. We all reassure ourselves that our memories are accurate and precise. Many people believe that they would be able to remember anything from the event and the different features of the situation. Yet, people don’t realize the fact that the more you think about a situation the more likely the story will change. Our memories are not a camcorder or a camera. Our memory tends to be very selective and reconstructive.
The human mind is such a complex entity in which it can change one’s concept of extreme situational memories as well as even simple memories. I feel that this has a huge impact upon the judicial system and the type of testimonies that are relied upon for court trials. So many lives are impacted over the result of memory errors that there ought to be more research studies devoted specifically to this topic which deals with false eyewitness testimonies concerning memory errors, and court cases.
Stressful events are apart of childhood but when stress becomes overwhelming, this can lead to psychological problems.
Overall, no matter what category we put stress in, it is always going to be a part of our lives. Either as a motivator or as problem that gets in the way. Cataclysmic events, personal stressors, background stressors, they are happening all around us and the only thing we can do is cope with it all. Once we know how stress affects us in our relationships and everyday lives the easier it is for us to cope with it all.
Stress is an ongoing dilemma that occurs in each and everyone’s life. It is a factor that is undoubtedly a part of daily living. Due to the trivial problems that occur in people’s daily lives massive amounts of stress can arise. People perceive and manage stress in many different ways. The causes and effects of stress are numerous and one’s ability to manage stress is vital in maintaining healthy living.
Lupien, S.J., McEwan, B.S., Gunnar, M.R., & Heim, C. (2009). Effects of stress throughout the lifespan on the brain, behavior and cognition. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 10(6), 434-445.
Stress is not always harmful, many individuals need a bit of low levels of stress to improve their performance. For example, students preparing for an exam will be motivated to do exceptionally well on the exam. High levels of stress will increase in anxiety, depression, hopelessness, and tension.
The term “stress” has multiple meanings. As Richard Lazarus stated in his 1966 book “Psycho...