Echoic Memory Analysis

Echoic Memory As I was reading through our course textbook, “Psychology: An Exploration,” by Saundra K. Ciccarelli and J. Noland White, I found the topic of memory in chapter 6 to be very interesting for many different reasons, but one main reason was because I have always been told ever since I was little, that I have one of the best memories when it comes to recalling things, from remembering something that happened a day ago to remembering something that occurred years ago. Therefore, memory has always been an interest in topic to me. I have always wondered what makes up a good memory system compared to a bad memory system. Reading through chapter 6 in our textbook, the topic on memory, there were so many different components that develops
Every person develops a different stage of memory. Sensory memory is memory that is lost within a second. Short-term memory is memory that is lost in 12 to 30 seconds. Long-term memory is “information retained indefinitely although some may be difficult to retrieve” (Ciccarelli, White, 2013). Those are some the basics behind the word memory and a brief summary of chapter 6. The term that I will mainly be discussing within this paper is apart of the sensory memory. “The first stage of memory, the point at which information enters the nervous system through the sensory systems—eyes, ears, and so on” (Ciccarelli, White, 2013). As stated above, the term is referred to as echoic memory. The term echoic memory is developed in the sensory memory. Echoic memory is the brief memory of something a person has heard (Ciccarelli, White, 2013). With echoic memory the information is not really processed when told to you, but several seconds later you realize what was told. “Echoic memory’s capacity is limited to what can be heard at any one moment and is smaller than the capacity of iconic memory” (Ciccarelli, White, 2013). Iconic memory is an image that you retain information from and stores it
In the topic of echoic memory, you do not “really process the statement from the other person as he or she said it,” you hear the statement, but your brain does not interpret it right away (Ciccarelli, White, 2013). “Instead, it took several seconds for you to realize that (1) something was said, (2) it may have been important, and (3) you’d better try to remember what it was” (Ciccarelli, White, 2013). “If you realize all this within about 4 seconds, you will more than likely be able to “hear” an echo of the statement in your head, a kind of instant replay” (Ciccarelli, White, 2013). For instance, in my first example above, my Dad knew something was being said to him by my Mom, when he asks her, “what,” he thinks to himself that it may have been something important, then he thinks, he’d better remember it, and then within a second he hears an echo in his head, which is his echoic memory, that restates the question that was asked to him and answers back to my Mom without her having to repeat herself. Some goes for my second example that was stated above in the second paragraph. I knew something was being said to me by a friend, as I was texting, I look up in confusion at the friend, then I think to myself, it was important, so I better try to remember it, and then I hear an echo in my head that replies the question for me that was asked by my friend and I answer my friend immediately.