Memory Retrieval

Over the years psychologists have come up with three different methods for testing memory retrieval from the brain. The three methods are recall, recognition, and relearning. The recall method is remembering something on your own without any cues. The recognition method is remembering when given something among others. The relearning method is relearning a previously learned thing.

The first method to be discussed is the recall method, remembering something on your own without any cues, or sometimes with a few cues. For this method a subject might be asked something along the lines of “Who came up with the law of universal gravitation?” or “Who came up with the three laws of motion?” The subject is then supposed to answer with no other help. Measuring this is fairly simple; it is just based upon whether the subject answers the question correctly or not, so this can be one of the easier methods of testing the retrieval of memory. However, recall memory retrieval is one of the less effective retrieval forms because subjects may have a lot of trouble with recalling information with no clues and it also depends on the content of what the subjects trying to remember, for instance, a studies have found that negative memories may be more accessible than positive memories, particularly when there is a history of trauma and/or parasuicidal behavior. So depending on the subject's background along with the content, different subjects will show different levels of recall.

The next type of method of memory retrieval is the recognition method. This method tests the subject’s ability to remember which thing is correct when it is among others that are incorrect. This test basically works like a multiple choice quiz where the subject may be asked a question like, “Who came up with the three laws of motion?” and is then given for choices, such as a. Einstein b. Galileo c. Newton d. Da Vinci. This method is easy to test  because it is based upon whether the subject chooses correctly or not. This method is also easier on the subject because they are given the right answer and they just have to recognize that it is the right answer to their question. This method can be effective for testing, however, one of the problems with it is that it is difficult to tell whether the subject guessed or actually remembered the answer. The tester can ask the subject, but while the subject can tell them if they knew it, if the subject says that they didn’t know it then the tester doesn’t know whether their memory played a part in it or not.  Studies have discovered a method for knowing how to tell if the subject did guess or actually remember is through event-related potential (ERP) studies of brain activity during the retrieval phase of recognition memory tasks which have reported left-lateralized positivity recorded at temporo-parietal sites, in the interval between 400 and 800 ms post stimulus onset, is greater for correctly recognized words than for correctly rejected new words, and therefore sometimes called the "retrieval success effect." This takes the unknown out of this testing method. 

The third type of memory retrieval testing is relearning. Relearning is when a subject relearns what they had previously known. If the relearning takes less time than the original learning than the original learning, then the information has been "remembered" in this sense. Relearning is the easiest to test and measure because all it takes is timing and teaching on the tester’s part and learning on the subject’s part. Relearning is the most useful method to test memory retrieval. It has the least amount of possible issues with it. Recall and recognition both run into the problems of subject guessing which can skew the results. Relearning is the easiest because all it takes is timing and teaching on the tester’s part and learning on the subject’s part. And because of all this has the least amount of possible error.