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This is an example essay to show students how to structure and use evidence in their essays.
How useful is the concept of a ‘Working Self’ in accounting for the functioning of autobiographical memory?
Autobiographical memories (AM) essentially come from our own lives and can vary from really important to mundane memories. These AM’s provide a personal biography for who we are and help in the formation of ‘the self’. These memories are like a giant database of ourselves which allow for continuity of our experiences. These AM’s include life changing, traumatic and emotional events which in turn help in the formation of our knowledge about us and these memories (AM) reinforce our understanding of ‘the self’.
The construction of these AM is a complex challenge which has several effects on our processing. Tulving (1983) argues that the entire cognitive system enters retrieval mode, whereby attention is directed towards internal representations of knowledge and our conscious awareness. This awareness then becomes dominated by these internal representations. However, research by Kelly (2000) tested the conception of a functionally independent working self by combining electrophysiological neuro-imaging with R/K judgements and a self-reference manipulation and found a new functional component which transcends the particular retrieval mode suggested by Tulving (1983).
To construct an AM requires lots of cognitive resources and Conway and Pleydell-Pearce (2000) argue that memory construction has to be controlled and therefore the ‘working self’ is seen as controller which picks memories from a hierarchy of interconnected goals such as our beliefs, values and attitudes. The ‘working self’ is an important part of what we remember and in what context we need to have memories. There is also research into a theory of mind (Keenan, 2000) which suggests that to be able to understand someone else’s view point these capabilities have emerge from self-awareness. The focus of this essay is looking at the working self as a concept and how it can account for the functioning of autobiographical memory.
The working self as a concept in accounting for the functioning of autobiographical memory is a strong idea. Our AM need the working self in order to select the memories required at certain times and contexts. If there was no way of selecting an AM we would experience cognitive overload and be unable to function. AM’s are like one giant library and the working self is similar to the librarian who finds the relevant books as and when required. The working self also moderates between the demands of coherence and correspondence in the formation of memories. The research into coherence can be found in a study by Conway (1990) which shows how coherent AM’s are consistent with a person’s goals and mild or severely incoherence can impact on the self e.g. a person sees themselves as a rock star even though he cannot play the guitar.
Tulving (1983) argued that our entire cognitive system enters a retrieval mode where attention is focused inwards towards internal representations knowledge and conscious awareness. However, research by Kelly (2000) tested for a functional independent working self using neuro-imaging techniques and found that a self reference manipulation produced qualitatively identical ERP effects regardless of whether memory was accessed autonoetically or noetically. Therefore, activity within a common neural sub-state is modulated irrespective of whether access to self-relevant info triggers recollection or occurs without reference to a particular experience. This evidence supports Conway’s proposal that explicit access to self-relevant information involves functionally independent executive control component (working self).
In a study by Conway (1990) he asked students prior to exams to report their expected grades, hours of study, how well they had prepared and the importance of the exam. Two weeks after the results were announced the students completed the same set of questions. The findings suggested that student’s who got better than expected results later reported the same level of effort in studying and the importance of the exam. Those who did worse than expected reported less effort than originally stated and claimed the test was less important than originally stated. This shows how a coherent working self will have high self-esteem and positive sense of well being (Csikszentmihalkyi & Beattie, 1979 & Conway, Singer et al., 2004).
In terms of AM retrieval there are two types 1: Generative – where deliberate recall of an AM as a result of a cue or 2: Direct or involuntary – where a cue is automatically activated. The working self is thought to inhibit those AM’s that do not fit the task or goal, therefore preventing cognitive overload than was mentioned earlier. The first major theory into speculating how AM’s are organised and retrieved came from Conway and Pleydell-Pearce (2000) and Conway (2005). They looked at a self memory system and suggested that this system has two components 1: AM’s are stored in the AM’s knowledge base and 2: AM’s are retrieved by the ‘Working Self’. It was thought that there is a hierarchy of AM’s which are organised from general to specific and that there is an order within this hierarchy which needs to be followed in order to access these memories. These memories form part of the life story which is split into themes for example at the top of the hierarchy would be work, leisure and education. These themes also form part of our lifetime periods which could be associated with general events or episodic memories. When recalling events we start at the top of the themes and work downwards to these episodic memories. Some supporting evidence comes from Conway and Fthenaki (2000) who reviewed work on amnesia and found that loss of AM’s is often in terms of a structural level in the hierarchy e.g. maintenance of the life story but complete loss of episodic memory.
Further support for the working self and amnesia suggests that our goal hierarchy and self-conceptions first emerge around the second year of the infant’s life, as the infant develops the ability for objective and subjective self-awareness e.g. ‘I’ and ‘Me’. Fivush (1996) found that children as young as 30 months have detailed AMs although they are not always available in adulthood. This suggests that the working self in relation to AM changes over the course of childhood and Erikson (1982) argues that it doesn’t stabilize until early adulthood. Further evidence that the working self is controlling AMs comes from lifespan retrieval curves (Franklin and Holding, 1977; Fitzgerald and Lawrence, 1984; Rubin et al., 1986; Rubin et al., 1998) which show the development of the self over time. The lifespan retrieval curve consists of three components (1) the period of childhood amnesia (2) the period of the reminiscence bump (3) period of recency. An example of this is show below in Figure 14.1
As the period of childhood amnesia shows there are little memories before the age of five and there are many theoretical explanations for this. From Conway and Pleydell-Pearce (2000) model of AM this early period is seen to reflect changes in the working self’s goal hierarchy. They argue that the goals of the infant (through which experience is encoded into memory) are so different from the adult, that the adult working self is unable to access those memories. Another argument comes from Freud (1955) who suggests that the working self of infancy/early childhood is much less able to control the occurrence and intensity of emotional experience. Episodic memories encoded during this stage are then saturated with intense emotions, and if recalled in maturity, could destabilise the adults working self by reinstating intense infant emotions. This view suggests that access to AMs encoded during this period might be quite powerfully limited by the adult working self, leading to lack of memories from this period. However, this is a psychoanalytic perspective and not a cognitive one.
Theory of mind by Keenan (2000) found that these capabilities emerge after the acquisition of self-awareness which develops around the ages of 36-48 months. Further, the relationship appears to be invariant, such that in almost all cases an individual must possess self-recognition before have theory of mind abilities.
To conclude, the working self as a concept is a good idea and makes logical sense. There is lots of supporting evidence for the working self and without this people would be working with cognitive overload. Our autobiographical memories tend to change as we develop from children into adults and vary from really important memories to the more mundane types. Conway (2000) argued that memory construction has to be controlled and the working self is the controller who picks out the relevant memories depending on the goals and tasks of the individual. This appears to happen through a hierarchy of themes (Conway and Pleydell-Pearce, 2000) goals and values. The working self is important in terms of what we remember and in what context which supports the notion of a working self as a concept for the functioning of autobiographical memory.
Further supporting evidence for the working self as a concept for the functioning of autobiographical memories came from studies into amnesia in children. Evidence from Fivush (1996) found that children aged 30 months have detailed AM’s which are not available in adulthood. This is evident when looking at reminiscence bumps from life span curves (Franklin and Holding, 1977; Fitzgerald and Lawrence, 1984; Rubin et al., 1986; Rubin et al., 1998), which is a good way to view the working self of a lifetime. The AM’s from early childhood (Freud, 1955) suggested that the working self in early childhood is much less able to control the occurrence and intensity of their emotional experience. This suggests that these early AM’s may become limited by the adult working self, leading to a lack of memories for these specific periods in life.
Word count: 1585
References
Braisby, N., and Gellatly, A. (2005) Cognitive Psychology, The Open University, Milton Keynes.
Conway, M.A. and Holmes, E.A. (2005) Autobiographical memory and the working self, Cognitive Psychology, The Open University, Milton Keynes.
Hayes, P. (2010) Autobiographical memory and working self, The Open University, Milton Keynes.
Keenan, P.J., Wheeler, M.A., Gallup, Jr, G.G. and Pascual-Leone, A. (2000) Self-recognition and the right prefrontal cortex, The Open University, Milton Keynes.
Magno, E. and Allan, K. (2007) Self-reference during explicit memory retrieval, An event-related potential analysis, The Open University, Milton Keynes.
Pechey, A. (2010) Remembering things, The Open University, Milton Keynes.
