Able to hold seven bits of information (plus or minus two) at any given time.
CHUNKING
Large amount of information is organized into fewer chunks or bits.
Example - combine telephone digits into larger chunks to reduce their memory burden (18005551212 chunks into 1-800, 555, 1212).
Synesthesia allows for sensorial chunking, which allows for an astonishing ability to chunk extremely large quantities of information (example - numbers are represented as colors and take on personalities).
MEMORY CONSOLIDATION
Encoding - the process in which information is transformed into a format in which it can be stored and retrieved, occurs in the limbic lobe (most notably, in the Papez and amygdaloid circuits)
Storage - the stockpiling of memory into its stored state, occurs in the neocortex.
Retrieval - the accessing of stored memories.
MULTIPLE MEMORY TRACE THEORY
Purports that the hippocampal-neocortical bond for episodic memory does not decay but, instead, persists as part of a memory scaffold (every time an episodic memory is retrieved, an additional memory trace is formed, and the hippocampal-neocortical ensemble of that memory is strengthened).
ANTEROGRADE AMNESIA
Inability to form new memories after the development of amnesia.
RETROGRADE AMNESIA
Inability to retrieve memories that occurred prior to the development of the amnesia.