In psychology, memory is the processes by which information is encoded, stored, and retrieved. Encoding allows information that is from the outside world to reach our senses in the forms of chemical and physical stimuli. In this first stage we must change the information so that we may put the memory into the encoding process. Storage is the second memory stage or process. This entails that we maintain information over periods of time. Finally the third process is the retrieval of information that we have stored. We must locate it and return it to our consciousness. Some retrieval attempts may be effortless due to the type of information.
From an information processing perspective there are three main stages in the formation and retrieval of memory:
- Encoding or registration: receiving, processing and combining of received information
- Storage: creation of a permanent record of the encoded information
- Retrieval, recall or recollection: calling back the stored information in response to some cue for use in a process or activity
Read more about Memory: Sensory Memory, Short-term Memory, Long-term Memory, Models, Types of Memory, Physiology, Cognitive Neuroscience of Memory, Genetics, Memory in Infancy, Memory and Aging, Disorders, Memory and Stress, Memory Construction, Improving Memory
Famous quotes containing the word memory:
“It is not however, adulthood itself, but parenthood that forms the glass shroud of memory. For there is an interesting quirk in the memory of women. At 30, women see their adolescence quite clearly. At 30 a woman’s adolescence remains a facet fitting into her current self.... At 40, however, memories of adolescence are blurred. Women of this age look much more to their earlier childhood for memories of themselves and of their mothers. This links up to her typical parenting phase.”
—Terri Apter (20th century)
“Like ultraviolet rays memory shows to each man in the book of life a script that invisibly and prophetically glosses the text.”
—Walter Benjamin (1892–1940)
“A man is the prisoner of his power. A topical memory makes him an almanac; a talent for debate, disputant; skill to get money makes him a miser, that is, a beggar. Culture reduces these inflammations by invoking the aid of other powers against the dominant talent, and by appealing to the rank of powers. It watches success.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)