...Final Paper The Effects of Retroactive Interference on Amnesia Patients Abstract New memories are fragile and vulnerable to interference. Patients who suffer from amnesia can often experience what is referred to as retrograde interference, which is the forgetting of newly learned information due to subsequent interference of additional material given to the subjects. This paper reflects on published articles regarding research about the effects of retroactive interference on the learning and memory retention ability of patients suffering from amnesia. Although research in this topic has not been able to fully answer the mystery that lies beyond the memory storage in the brain, many experiments have been conducted regarding this ailment. Articles on this topic vary in experimentation, yet they all show that interference subsequent to the learning of new information impairs memory consolidation substantially. This idea of retroactive interference dates back to the 1900s and new ideas and theories have been built upon it since. The findings in these articles strongly indicate that patients with anterograde amnesia are better able to form new long-term memory traces than previously presumed. Future research on this topic would lead to a greater variety of discoveries and establish newer memory training methods. The Effects of Retroactive Interference on Amnesia Patients Anterograde amnesia is a severe impairment of memory that hinders the ability to build new memories...
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...How It Has Touched My Life Dementia is an illness that occurs when there is a loss of brain function as a result of the presence of certain diseases. Dementia affects a person’s memory, judgment, behavior, thinking, and language. Dementia includes Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and tends to increase the most from the age of 65. Various references and literature in reference to dementia indicate that the number of patients with dementia will increase significantly as society ages, especially within the next three decades. Dementia causes significant family issues and can become a financial burden on patients and their family members. These burdens impair the ability of a person to function independently and also have a tremendous impact on his or her relationships and quality of life. The subject of this paper will discuss an overview of dementia, treatments of dementia, how it affects human lives, and also the affect dementia has had on the life of the writer of this paper An Overview of Dementia: How It Has Touched My Life As a child growing up in the early 1970s, the writer of this paper can recall his neighborhood. It was peaceful and had a several people who were known elderly and considered as senior citizens. The writer of this paper also remembers when the adults of the neighborhood would speak of the elderly and tend to talk the most about their strange behaviors. Although this was often the case, the talk of the elderly was only that...
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...PURPOSES TERM PAPER ALZHEIMER’S DISEASE: NOT JUST A LOSS OF MEMORY Prepared by: XXXXXXXXX (matric no.) XXXXXXXXX (matric no.) Group XXX Prepared for: XXXXXXXXXXXX Date of Submission: July 2011 Introduction Alzheimer's disease, a neurodegenerative brain disease, is the most common cause of dementia. It currently afflicts about 4 million Americans and is the fourth leading cause of death in the United States. Furthermore, Alzheimer’s disease is the leading cause of mental impairment in elderly people and accounts for a large percentage of admissions to assisted living homes, nursing homes, and other long-term care facilities. Psychotic symptoms, such as delusions and hallucinations, have been reported in a large proportion of patients with this disease. In fact, it is the presence of these psychotic symptoms can lead to early institutionalization (Bassiony, et al, 2000). Learning about Alzheimer’s disease and realizing that it is much more that just a loss of memory can benefit the families of those with the disorder as well as society as a whole. This paper is to look at the disorder, as well as to discuss the history, symptoms, diagnosis, current researches and hopes of a cure for Alzheimer’s disease. History Around the turn of the century, two kinds of dementia were defined by Emil Kraepin: senile and presenile. The presenile form was described more in detail by Alois Alzheimer as a progressive deterioration of intellect, memory and orientation...
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...Just Loss of Memory This is a 8 page, 10 resource paper discussing Alzheimer’s disease, discussing the history, symptoms, diagnosis and hopes for a cure of the disease. Alzheimer’s Disease: Not Just Loss of Memory Introduction Alzheimer's disease, a neurodegenerative brain disease, is the most common cause of dementia. It currently afflicts about 4 million Americans and is the fourth leading cause of death in the United States. Furthermore, Alzheimer’s disease is the leading cause of mental impairment in elderly people and accounts for a large percentage of admissions to assisted living homes, nursing homes, and other long-term care facilities. Psychotic symptoms, such as delusions and hallucinations, have been reported in a large proportion of patients with this disease. In fact, it is the presence of these psychotic symptoms can lead to early institutionalization (Bassiony, et all, 2000). Learning about Alzheimer’s disease and realizing that it is much more that just a loss of memory can benefit the families of those with the disorder as well as society as a whole. The purpose of this paper is to look at the disorder, as well as to discuss the history, symptoms, diagnosis and hopes of a cure for Alzheimer’s disease. History Around the turn of the century, two kinds of dementia were defined by Emil Kraepin: senile and presenile. The presenile form was described more in detail by Alois Alzheimer as a progressive deterioration of intellect, memory and orientation...
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... theories, and approaches to the scientific study of behavior and mental processes. B. This course satisfies three semester hours of the Social/Behavioral Science for the Associate of Science and Associate of Arts degrees. Please check your degree plan to determine the status of this course in your program of study. C. Through this course, students will prepare for contemporary challenges by developing and demonstrating critical thinking skills, communication skills, social responsibility, and empirical and quantitative skills. D. Prerequisites(s): None II. Learning Outcomes Upon successful completion of this course, students will be able to: A. Identify various research methods and their characteristics used in the scientific study of psychology. B. Describe the historical influences and early schools of thought that shaped the field of psychology. C. Describe some of the prominent perspectives and approaches used in the study of psychology. D. Use terminology unique to the study of psychology. E. Describe accepted approaches and standards in psychological assessment and evaluation. F. Identify factors in physiological and psychological processes involved in human behavior. III. Instructional Materials The instructional material identified for this course is viewable from www.ctcd.edu/books IV. Course Requirements Updated June 2015 Class Performance: Your instructor will summarize and discuss CTC’s academic polices. You may refer to the CTC catalog...
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...Final Research Paper Ryan Hermes Health 106 SP 13 “Alzheimer’s Disease; A Disease Without A Cure” Alzheimer’s disease, otherwise known as dementia, is a genetic disease that causes the brain to deteriorate until death. Currently, there is no cure for Alzheimer’s disease, and once the diagnosis is given the disease only gets worse. The disease isn’t very well understood, however researchers are working to help treat the symptoms of the disease. With all of the advancements in medicine there are no treatments available to stop or reverse the progression of Alzheimer’s disease. In 1901 a German psychiatrist named Alois Alzheimer’s documented the first recorded case of Alzheimer’s disease. He studied a woman named Auguste Deter, she was a woman in her fifties who had severe early onset Alzheimer’s disease, and she died in 1906. After her death, Alzheimer’s worked with two Italian physicians on staining techniques to study Auguste’s brain. He noted certain plaques that infiltrated her brain, however technology could only go so far at the time so the results of the brain examination were speculative. Alzheimer’s disease affects the brain in a way that causes its victims to lose some or most of their memory. This causes the patient to forget things such as who they are, who their relatives are, where they are, how to get home, or even when or how to eat. These problems make caring for the patient difficult because the care person has to do almost everything...
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...Abstract—This paper addresses the topic of methods for producing inter procedural static data flow graphs. The method used in this paper is a sort of progressive mining approach: A start location for the data flow edges is outlined, and through multiple iterations, the forward data flow step operation is taken on the universe, until no new paths have been found. I. INTRODUCTION New tools often provide novel approaches to longstanding problems. In the next update of C-Atlas, Ensoft intends to update the capabilities of C-Atlas. These improvements are intended to provide a customizable approach to evaluating a program’s design, structure, and security. Such an update seeks to address any number of problems. Analyzing a C program’s memory management is one such problem. This project would seek to use C-Atlas to better analyze C memory management. In memory leak (memory management) analysis, the user must show that for every path forward from an variable’s allocation, there exists at least one deallocation site for that variable. This task is trivial, unless the variable’s allocation and deallocation(s) are separated by a vast field of possible control flow. C-Atlas offers a flexible interface for data flow graph generation as a solution to this problem. Through this interface, one may then produce connected data flow graphs, allowing a single variable’s path to be traced through multiple functions. This visual aide can greatly increase the time efficiency of performing memory leak...
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...Research Proposal: People views about the Psychological role of sleep in our lives Date: August 26, 2013 Subject: Proposal to do a research paper/project on the people views about the psychological role of sleep in our lives. INTRODUCTION Sleep has been the subject of speculation and thought since the time of the early Greek philosophers, but recently scientists have discovered ways to study sleep in a systematic and objective way. With the advent of new technology, scientists are now being able to measure electrical patterns and activity produce by the sleeping brain. Sleeping time is controlled by circadian clock (a biochemical mechanism that oscillates with a period of 24 hours and is coordinated within day-night cycle) and in humans to some extent by willed behavior. Sleep helps the brain commit new information to memory through a process called memory consolidation. Psychological role of sleep has a great impact on our lives. In today’s society, a lack of sleep and high energy are accepted as the “norm”. It seems that people have lost sight of the importance of sleep on our mental and physical health. Many research studies have been conducted and have found that there are many benefits to sleeping regularly and well. It is not quantity that matters so much as quality of sleep. Research has also been done to study the future of sleep and how that may affect people psychologically. The field of sleep psychology is advancing, and will surely change...
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...Alzheimer’s Disease: Not Just Loss of Memory Introduction Alzheimer's disease, a neurodegenerative brain disease, is the most common cause of dementia. It currently afflicts about 4 million Americans and is the fourth leading cause of death in the United States. Furthermore, Alzheimer’s disease is the leading cause of mental impairment in elderly people and accounts for a large percentage of admissions to assisted living homes, nursing homes, and other long-term care facilities. Psychotic symptoms, such as delusions and hallucinations, have been reported in a large proportion of patients with this disease. In fact, it is the presence of these psychotic symptoms can lead to early institutionalization (Bassiony, et all, 2000). Learning about Alzheimer’s disease and realizing that it is much more that just a loss of memory can benefit the families of those with the disorder as well as society as a whole. The purpose of this paper is to look at the disorder, as well as to discuss the history, symptoms, diagnosis and hopes of a cure for Alzheimer’s disease. History Around the turn of the century, two kinds of dementia were defined by Emil Kraepin: senile and presenile. The presenile form was described more in detail by Alois Alzheimer as a progressive deterioration of intellect, memory and orientation. As a neuropathologist, Alzheimer studied the case a 51 year-old woman. When she died, Alzheimer performed an autopsy and found that she had “cerebral atrophy”...
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...Memory plays an important role from the early stages of life until the body starts to deteriorate. Information needs to be stored in our memory in order for it to be processed and accessible when needed. The memory portion of the brain allows us to furnish our mind with emotions, knowledge and thoughts that aids in accomplishing everyday tasks. Memory contributes to the ability of recalling events, connecting one point to another, and incorporates the world of the implicit. In other words, memory has the ability to guide the mind through effortless tasks without being consciously aware. For example, a person does not need to recall every motion in riding a bike after the process is already learned. However, memory may be affected by amnesia. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the role of memory and brain structures involved with anterograde and retrograde amnesia Amnesia is a condition that involves partial or complete loss of memory. The severity of memory loss is determined by which part of the brain was affected. Major brain structures involved with memory are the hippocampus and the temporal lobes. The hippocampus is a structure within the brain and part of the limbic system. This structure significantly contributes to memory, and may be related to processing information and the formation of recent memories. According to Kim and Fanselow (1992), damage to the hippocampus results in the impairment of recent memories, but not remote A study conducted by Kim and Fanselow...
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...credit, he had become chairman of the Department of Psychiatry and Neurology at the University of Virginia in 1957. The following year, the American Society for Psychical Research announced a contest in honor of William James for the best essay on‘‘the topic of paranormal mental phenomena and their relationship to the problem of survival of the human personality after bodily death.’’ Ian, who had said when he interviewed for the chairman position that he had an interest in parapsychology, had been intrigued by the concept of reincarnation and in his readings had come across reports of individuals claiming to have memories of previous lives, or‘‘apparent memories of former incarnations,’’ as he called them. The reports came from a number of sources, such as books, magazines, and newspapers. Ian analyzed 44 of them as a group in a paper that won the contest and was subsequently published in 1960 (Stevenson, 1960a,b). He was impressed with the similarities in cases from different countries and different kinds of sources. As he told Tom Shroder years later,‘‘these forty-four cases, when you put them together, it just seemed inescapable to me that there must be something there.... I couldn’t see how they could all be faked or they could all be a deception’’(Shroder, 1999: 103). At the end of the paper, he wrote that more study of the...
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...and the damage it causes in the human brain. The general population is under the impression that AD is a result of the normal human developmental process of aging. The focus of this research is to dismiss this misconception by providing indisputable empirical evidence to the contrary. This paper looks at the various studies explored by researchers in an attempt to show the factors attributed to AD, a population over the age of 65 that do not suffer from AD, and a population of as young as 18 clinically diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. The author also addresses life style, environmental, and genetic risk factors attributed to the development of AD. Alzheimer's Disease and its Link to the Normal Human Developmental Process of Aging Contrary to popular belief, studies show that Alzheimer’s disease is not part of the normal human developmental process of aging. It is imperative that researchers acknowledge that AD is not part of the normal aging process. Researchers must keep an open mind during the research and experimental process, exploring all plausible arguments, in order to discover the cause(s) and/or cure to any disease. This would include having an interdisciplinary approach to the study. Currently, the cause(s) of AD is unknown (Nowrangi MA, 2011). Data collected from studies as early as ten years ago would suggest that AD is a degenerative disease attributed to the normal aging process. However, current studies, with the use of new technology, shows that AD is not...
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...Verbal Learning Amber Dauen PSYCH/550 October 27, 2014 Professor Weisz Verbal Learning Paper Every person has his or her own learning preference. There are many different learning styles to choose from. Learning style is the way in which each learner begins to concentrate on, process, absorb, and retain new and difficult information (Bjork, McDaniel, Pashler, & Rohrer, 2008). Research in verbal learning follows the work of Herman Ebbinghaus who identified verbal learning methods that are still used today. In this paper, the concept of verbal learning will be described. The similarities and differences of serial learning, paired associated learning, and free call will be discussed. Finally, the concept of mnemonics in the recall...
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...wrote a detailed account defining the hidden facts behind the disease. Yet it wasn’t until 1911 when Charles Davenport made major contributions in acknowledging and understanding the sings, symptoms and heritability of HD. The National Library of Medicine defines Huntington’s disease as a genetic degenerative disorder of neurons due to a defect in one part of the DNA. HD is recognized as a hereditary neurological disorder taking a devastating toll slowly diminishing an individual’s ability to speak, walk and reason. Because HD is a programmed genetic disorder its degeneration of nerve cells results in uncontrollable movements, emotional disturbance, and eventually memory loss. Signs: Early onset signs of HD typically trail in three stages: Early-Stage HD, Middle-Stage HD, and Late-Stage HD. In the early stage HD individuals are diagnosed with a warning of symptoms but can still perform daily routine activities. Middle-Stage HD are developing signs such as losing the ability to perform certain activities and control muscle movements. In the final fatal late stage HD individuals loose the ability to speak and are...
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...Brenda Silva Waubonsee Community College PSY 205 Research Paper Mr. Scott Hollenback October 27, 2011 Alzheimer Disease As Kevin Arnold quotes, “Memory is a way of holding on to things you love, the things you are, and the things you never want to lose.” Memories are the things we uphold. Whether it’s bad or good, those memories are engraved in us and can’t be stolen from us. But what if as time goes by, those memories are losing? Worst, you’re even losing your language skills, ability to recognize familiar things and you feel sense of depression. This means, as a person grows old he/she experiences deterioration in one’s self. Now, we are currently living in the age of technology. Our advancements in the past few decades overshadow everything learned in the last 2000 years. This increase has bought with it a large increase in disease afflicting the elderly community. AD once thought to be a natural part of aging, is a severely debilitating form of mental dementia. Although some other types of dementia are curable or effectively treatable, there is currently no cure for Alzheimer. A general overview of AD including the clinical description, diagnosis, and progression of symptoms, helps one to further understand the treatment and care of patients. Alzheimer’s is a type of dementia that causes problems with memory, thinking, and behavior. Alzheimer’s is the most common form of dementia, a general term for memory loss and other intellectual abilities serious enough...
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