The study investigated aspects of self-rated autobiographical memory between young and middle-aged adults, as well as examined sex differences. A Swedish version of a self-rating questionnaire was used online to assess autobiographical memory. The Survey of autobiographical memory assesses autobiographical memory abilities in episodic, semantic, spatial, and future domains. Forty-one healthy volunteers were included. The youngest group (Mage=26), had 70% women and middle-aged adults (Mage=44) had 50 % percent women. The mean age for women was (M= 30, range = 30) and the mean age for men was (M=34, range= 30). Univariate General Linear Model was performed to determine whether there is a significant mean difference between the age-groups and sex, while a repeated-measures multivariate analysis of variance assessed the interaction between age group and memory type. It was hypothesized that there would be no difference between young and middle-aged adults in semantic autobiographical memory, but that episodic autobiographical memory would be rated lower by the middle-aged adults. The two dependent variables were semantic and episodic scores. No significant effects were found for age-group or sex on the total, episodic, and semantic scores. The age-group by memory-type interaction showed that semantic and episodic memories were not rated differently by the two age-groups. One reason for these non-significant outcomes could be the overall small sample sizes. Further elaboration is needed to assess the aspects of self-rated AM changes from young to middle adulthood, including sex differences in the self-assessment since not many studies have addressed such questions. / Studien undersökte aspekter avsjälvskattat självbiografiskt minne mellan unga vuxna och individer i medelåldern samt även könsskillnader. En svensk version av ett självsskattningsfrågeformulär användes online för att undersöka självbiografiskt minne. Frågeformuläret bedömer autobiografiska minnesförmågor inom episodiska, semantiska, rumsliga och framtida domäner. Fyrtio friska deltagare medverkade i undersökningen. Den yngsta gruppen (M ålder=26), hade 70% kvinnor, medan medelålders vuxna (M ålder =44), hade 50% kvinnor. Medelåldern för kvinnor var (M = 30, intervall = 30) och mäns var (M = 34, intervall = 30). Univariata allmänna linjär modeller utfördes för att bestämma om det finns en signifikant genomsnittlig skillnad mellan åldersgrupperna och kön, medan en multivariat variansanalys med upprepade mätningar bedömde interaktionen mellan åldersgrupp ochminnestyp. Det antogs att det inte skulle finnas någon skillnad mellan unga och i det semantiska självbiografiska minnet, men att episodiskt självbiografiskt minne skulle skattas lägre efter medelåldern. De två beroende variablerna var semantiska och episodiska poäng. Inga signifikanta effekter hittades för åldersgrupp eller kön på den totala, episodiska och semantiska poängen. Interaktionen mellan åldersgrupp och minnestyp visade att semantiska och episodiska minnen inte bedömdes annorlunda av de två åldersgrupperna.

Il existe un lien bidirectionnel entre identité et mémoire, la mémoire autobiographique contenant toutes les informations qui permettent à un individu de se définir. Or, un point important de notre identité est de se définir en tant qu'homme ou femme. De plus, d'un point de vue cognitif, hommes et femmes présentent des différences de performances à un certain nombre de tâches dont des tâches de mémoire autobiographique. Dans cette thèse, nous avons souhaité investiguer à partir de méthodes comportementales et en neuroimagerie fonctionnelle les différences entre hommes et femmes dans la mémoire autobiographique épisodique et sémantique et ses liens avec l'identité, afin de déterminer si ces différences sont plutôt dues à des facteurs biologiques inhérents au sexe ou sociaux inhérents à l'identité de genre. Nos résultats convergent vers l'idée que l'identité de genre est plus déterminante que l'appartenance à un sexe dans la construction des souvenirs. / There is a bidirectional link between identity and memory because autobiographical memory contains all the information that allows an individual to define oneself. However an important matter about our identity is to be defined as a man or a woman. In addition, from a cognitive point of view, men and women show differencies in their performance in some tasks including autobiographical memory tasks. In this thesis, we wanted to investigate the differences between men and women in episodic and semantic autobiographical memory with behavioural and functional neuroimaging methods and their links with identity so as to determine if these differences are rather due to biological factors inherent to sex or to social factors inherent to gender identity. Our results converge on the idea that gender identity is more crucial than membership to one sex in the construction of memories.

Thesis advisor: Elizabeth Kensinger / Individuals with social anxiety disorder (SAD) tend to have emotional memory biases in the encoding and retrieval of social memories. Research has shown reduced heart rate variability (HRV) in clinical populations suffering from anxiety, including social anxiety. Heightened sympathetic activation—as measured by the electrodermal activity (EDA)—has also been associated with anxiety disorders. The aim of the present study was to examine the relation between HRV, social anxiety, and re-experiencing of emotional autobiographical memories. 44 healthy young adults were recruited from the Boston College campus through SONA. Participants were given an online survey that instructed them to retrieve 40 specific events from the past in response to 40 socially relevant cues. For each event, participants were instructed to provide a brief narrative, make several ratings for the event (on a scale from 1-7), and indicate the specific emotions they experienced both at the time of retrieval and of the event. Approximately one month after the completion of the memory survey, participants engaged in a 2-hour memory retrieval session while undergoing psychophysiological monitoring (heart rate, skin conductance, and respiration). Following the retrieval task, participants completed self-report questionnaires of social anxiety symptom severity and trait emotion regulation strategy (i.e., tendency to reappraise or suppress emotions). The present study found that positive memories had higher re-experiencing ratings as compared to negative memories. Contrary to the original study hypothesis, however, there was no significant interaction between average re-experiencing (or arousal) ratings of positive or negative social autobiographical memories and SAD likelihood. A nonlinear, cubic relationship was found between one of three metrics of HRV and social anxiety symptom severity. A significant effect was found between skin conductance and SAD likelihood, which was likely driven by an almost significance difference in skin conductance between the SAD unlikely and the SAD very probable groups; these findings provide further insight into the relationship between autonomic nervous system (ANS) functioning and social anxiety. Further, the present results suggest the intriguing possibility that there may be a nonlinear relationship between HRV and severity of social anxiety. Future research with a larger sample size is needed to corroborate these findings. / Thesis (BS) — Boston College, 2018. / Submitted to: Boston College. College of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Departmental Honors. / Discipline: Psychology.

No description available.

本研究的主要目的在於運用自傳式記憶的作業探討高社交焦慮者是否有記憶偏誤的現象。根據Clark和Wells（1995）的模型，高社交焦慮者在社交焦慮情境中容易把大部分的注意力集中在自身相關（self-related）的訊息上，因而造成對自身相關訊息的記憶優於外界環境訊息的現象；然而根據Repee和Heimberg（1997）的模型則假設高社交焦慮者在社交情境中會關注與負向自我評價有關的訊息，而不論該訊息是來自自身或外界環境。本研究企圖同時檢測上述兩個模型。 本研究篩選出六十四名大學生分為高社交焦慮與低社交焦慮兩組，所有受試者皆須分別回憶一件社交焦慮事件及一件中性事件，受試者被要求先在腦海中形成對該事件的影像，然後寫下有關回憶事件的詳細描述並完成記憶清晰度的評估。 研究結果得出高社交焦慮者在進行社交焦慮事件的回憶時，傾向回憶出比低社交焦慮組更多的自身相關訊息；且高社交焦慮組在回憶社交焦慮事件時比低社交焦慮組更傾向評估自身相關訊息的記憶清晰度高於外界環境訊息，研究結果較支持Clark和Well（1995）的說法。 / The purpose of the present study was to utilize the autobiographical memory task to investigate the memory bias in socially anxious individuals. According to Clark and Wells’ (1995) view, socially anxious individuals were hypothesized to preferentially allocate almost attentional resources to self-related information and remember self-related information better than external information on entering an anxiety-provoking social situation. However, according to Repee and Heimberg’ s (1997) model, they supposed that socially anxious individuals tend to focus on negative self-evaluated information regardless of it were self-related or external information. The present study tried to examine the two models simultaneously. Sixty-four undergraduate students were assigned to either high or low social-anxiety group. All subjects were asked to recall one anxiety-provoking social situation about public-speaking and another neutral situation. They were requested to form an image of the event and write a detailed description about it. They then completed rating of memory vividness for each situation. The results revealed that high social anxiety group showed to retrieve more self-related information than low social anxiety group and displayed more preferential to rate the vividness of self-related information higher than external environmental information than low social anxiety group did when recalling anxiety-provoking social situation. The result supported Clark and Wells’ s model.

Thèse numérisée par la Division de la gestion de documents et des archives de l'Université de Montréal.

Il a été suggéré que lorsqu’une trace de mémoire consolidée est rappelée (réactivée), elle devient instable et sujette aux modifications avant de se stabiliser à nouveau en mémoire à long terme. Nous avons récemment démontré que lorsque la réactivation d’un souvenir négatif est couplée à l’exposition à un stress psychosocial, le souvenir de l’évènement négatif est augmenté de façon durable. En se basant sur ces résultats, le but de cette thèse est de préciser le rôle du stress psychologique et physiologique (hormones de stress) sur la modulation de souvenirs réactivés. Plus précisément, la première étude visait à déterminer si le cortisol, hormone de stress majeure, est un joueur clé dans la modulation des souvenirs réactivés. Pour ce faire, nous avons inhibé pharmacologiquement les niveaux de cortisol au moment de la réactivation d’un souvenir contenant des segments neutres et négatifs. Les résultats démontrent que la réactivation du matériel négatif est amoindrie lorsque les niveaux de cortisol sont inhibés, et cet effet est toujours présent quatre jours plus tard. Étant donné que les stimuli utilisés jusqu’à maintenant ont une faible validité écologique, nous avons voulu déterminer si d’autres types de mémoires pouvaient également être modulables lors de leur réactivation. L’objectif de la deuxième étude était donc de déterminer si les mémoires autobiographiques collectives sont modulables par le stress au moment de leur réactivation. Pour ce faire, nous avons exposé les participants à de vrais extraits de journaux, neutres ou négatifs, afin de réactiver les mémoires collectives associées à ces évènements. Par la suite, tous les participants ont été exposés à un stress psychosocial et leur mémoire des extraits a été évaluée la journée suivante. Les résultats démontrent que les femmes ayant lu les nouvelles négatives avaient une réactivité physiologique accrue face au stresseur et une mémoire augmentée de ces mêmes nouvelles le jour suivant. Ce phénomène n’était cependant pas observable chez les hommes. Le but de la troisième étude était de déterminer si les mémoires autobiographiques personnelles sont modulables par le stress au moment de leur réactivation. Nous avons demandé aux participants de se remémorer deux évènements de leur passé, négatifs ou neutres. Par la suite, ils ont été exposés à un stress psychosocial et leur mémoire pour ces mêmes évènements a été évaluée à nouveau la journée suivante. Les résultats démontrent que les mémoires autobiographiques personnelles réactivées ne semblent pas être modulables par l’exposition à un stresseur. Globalement, les résultats de cette thèse démontrent que le cortisol a la capacité de moduler des souvenirs négatifs réactivés, mais que la nature (extrinsèque vs. intrinsèque) et l'intensité des souvenirs réactivés sont des facteurs déterminants pour que ce phénomène prenne place. / It has been suggested that when a consolidated memory trace is recalled (reactivated), it becomes active and sensitive to modifications before stabilizing again in the long-term memory system. We have recently demonstrated that when the reactivation of a negative memory is followed by exposition to a psychosocial stressor, the memory for the negative material is enhanced in a long-lasting manner. Based on these results, the goal of this thesis is to clarify the role of physiological (stress hormones) and psychological stress on the modulation of reactivated memories. More precisely, the first study aimed to determine whether cortisol, a major stress hormone, is a key player in the modulation of reactivated memories. To do so, we have pharmacologically inhibited cortisol levels at the time of reactivating a memory composed of neutral and negative segments. Results showed that the reactivation of the negative material is decreased when cortisol levels are inhibited and this effect is still present four days later. Given that the stimuli used so far have a weak ecological validity, we wanted to determine whether other types of memories could also be modified upon their reactivation. The goal of the second study was to examine whether collective autobiographical memories were sensitive to the effects of stress at the time of reactivation. To do so, we have exposed participants to real newspaper excerpts, either neutral or negative, in order to reactivate the collective memories associated to these events. We have then exposed all the participants to a psychosocial stressor and their memory for the excerpts was assessed the following day. Results showed that women who have read negative news excerpts had a more pronounced physiological reactivity to the stressor and an increased memory for these news the following day. This phenomenon, however, was not observed in men. The goal of the third study was to determine whether personal autobiographical memories were sensitive to the effects of stress at the time of their reactivation. We have asked participants to recall two personal events, either negative or neutral. We then exposed them to a stressor and their memory for these events was tested the following day. The results showed that reactivated personal autobiographical memories were not sensitive to stress. Globally, the results of this thesis show that cortisol has the capacity to modulate reactivated negative memories, but that the nature (extrinsic vs. intrinsic) and the intensity of the memories are determining factors for this phenomenon to occur.

A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Arts, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Johannesburg, 2015 / This research looks at home video footage and family photographs as part of the visual portrait of a curated record of the autobiographical self. The research includes a written thesis exploring the theoretical concerns and provides a reflexive analysis of the creative component of the PhD, which is a 60-minute documentary film. The research, both creative and written, assesses how autobiographical memory is informed and shaped by home video recordings, and how new digital formats have allowed home video to collapse the boundaries between the personal and the public. It also explores how personal narratives speak to the wider socio-political and cultural concerns of a particular time. These ‘collapses’ between boundaries provide a playful, pluralistic approach to a history of the self. The many paradigms that coexist within the work – the past and the present, time and space, previously accepted narratives and newly formed ones – do not exist as binary to each other, but rather exist in conversation with each other and serves to explore the ever elastic subject/object dichotomy. The autobiographical film is titled Fraternal, with the tagline ‘The future isn’t like it used to be’. It tells the emotional story of the relationships between myself and my twin, and our parents – the hellos and goodbyes, arrivals and departures, beginnings and endings that happen within family ties. The film is set against the backdrop of the political situation in southern Africa during the 1980s and 1990s. It is cut predominantly from personal home video footage: a mixture of Super 8mm, Hi8 and DV footage shot largely between 1984 and 1994 in Zimbabwe and South Africa

Submitted by Filipe dos Santos (fsantos@pucsp.br) on 2017-10-06T12:50:13Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Eliane Vasconcelos Diógenes.pdf: 3108183 bytes, checksum: 799042cd1b7a2f61cc07232723b962e8 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-10-06T12:50:13Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Eliane Vasconcelos Diógenes.pdf: 3108183 bytes, checksum: 799042cd1b7a2f61cc07232723b962e8 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2017-09-19 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior - CAPES / This research analyzes significance and singularity of the current communication phenomenon in which documentary filmmakers, under the influence either of death trauma or the absence of a person from their family group, aim to recover their stories and their memories through moviemaking. We scrutinize how such intimate, tragic and personal family narratives turn into attractive documentaries that are becoming increasingly prestigious in the audiovisual scene. The first stage of the research consisted in investigating designations and concepts of the documentary with autobiographical narrative. Then, we ascertained about some family stories in the history of documentary cinema, exploring traditions and changes and, subsequently, we examined (auto)biographical narratives in media culture. After that, we analyzed the searching experience for the other through documentary (the interlace between memory and fantasy, mourning preparation and the ethical question between public and private tensions), and at last we explored the aesthetic experiences (creation and reception) implied in this type of documentary. For the dissertation corpus, we selected only the Brazilian feature documentaries exhibited in film festivals that had an impact in specialized criticism. The documentaries are: Diário de uma busca (Flávia Castro, 2010), Elena (Petra Costa, 2012), Mataram meu irmão (Cristiano Burlan, 2013) and Os dias com ele (Maria Clara Escobar, 2013). This research is theoretically based in the interdisciplinary perspective originated from the interface between communication and psychoanalysis. From the studies of documentary film in the communication area, we highlight the following themes: the documentary concept, the history of documentary, the family film, the use of archive image, alterity, ethics and aesthetics. From the psychoanalitic theory, concerning Sigmund Freud and Jacques Lacan’s paradigm, we approach the following concepts: subject, memory, fantasy, family romance, mourning, ethics, sublimation and relation between the subject and the image. In terms of methodology, the research is characterized as bibliographic research and as film analysis, presenting an investigation about narration, image, connections between image and sound and montage. In these Brazilian (auto)biographical documentaries, we watch a performing mode to narrate the story of the other who had gone. The documentary filmmaker’s subjectivity interferes decisively in this narrative which memory and fantasy interlace, resulting in an engaging narrative that has its own hybrid language. Therefore, these stories are no longer intimate and particular, they also become public and universal in a public-private-shared-collective metamorphic state of flux. The complexity of life is contemplated, when the borders of documentary advance on the limits of art and its creative possibilities / Esta pesquisa analisa a significação e a singularidade do fenômeno comunicacional atual, no qual o documentarista, sob efeito do trauma da morte ou da ausência de uma pessoa do seu complexo familiar, busca recuperar suas histórias e suas memórias por meio da realização do filme. Examinamos como essas narrativas familiares tão íntimas, trágicas e particulares se transformam em documentários atraentes e cada vez mais prestigiados no cenário audiovisual. A primeira etapa da pesquisa consistiu em investigar nomeações e conceitos de documentário com narrativa autobiográfica. Em seguida, averiguamos histórias de família na história do cinema documental, explorando tradições e transformações e, posteriormente, examinamos narrativas (auto)biográficas na cultura midiática. Após isso, analisamos a experiência de busca do outro por meio do documentário (entrelaçamento entre memória e fantasia, elaboração do luto e questão da ética nas tensões entre o privado e o público) e, por fim, exploramos as experiências estéticas (criação e recepção) implicadas nesse tipo de documentário. Para o corpus deste trabalho, selecionamos apenas os documentários brasileiros de longa-metragem exibidos em festivais de cinema e que tiveram repercussão na crítica especializada. São eles: Diário de uma busca (Flávia Castro, 2010), Elena (Petra Costa, 2012), Mataram meu irmão (Cristiano Burlan, 2013) e Os dias com ele (Maria Clara Escobar, 2013). Esta pesquisa fundamenta-se teoricamente na perspectiva interdisciplinar a partir da interface entre comunicação e psicanálise. Dos estudos provenientes da área da comunicação sobre cinema documentário, destacamos os seguintes temas: conceito de documentário, história do documentário, filme de família, uso de imagem de arquivo, alteridade, ética e estética. A partir da teoria psicanalítica, por meio do paradigma de Sigmund Freud e de Jacques Lacan, abordamos os seguintes conceitos: sujeito, memória, fantasia, romance familiar, luto, ética, sublimação e relação entre sujeito e imagem. Quanto à metodologia, a pesquisa se caracteriza como pesquisa bibliográfica e como análise fílmica, apresentando a investigação sobre narração, imagem, relações entre imagem e som e montagem. Nos documentários (auto)biográficos brasileiros, assistimos ao modo performático de narrar a história do outro, que partiu. A subjetividade do documentarista interfere decisivamente nessa narrativa, em que memória e fantasia se entrelaçam, resultando numa narrativa envolvente, com linguagem própria e híbrida. Desse modo, essas histórias deixam de ser apenas íntimas e particulares, passando também a ser públicas e universais, no fluxo das metamorfoses público-privado-compartilhado-coletivo. A complexidade da vida está contemplada, quando as fronteiras do documentário avançam os limites da arte e suas possibilidades criativas

Syftet med studien var att undersöka våra viktigaste positiva och negativa självbiografiska arbetsplatsminnen hos chefer och ej-chefer relaterade till arbetsrelaterad identitet och arbetsplatsminnens fenomenologi. Totalt deltog 194 personer, 124 män och 70 kvinnor i åldern 25 - 65 år i studien. Mätinstrumentet för studien bestod av en enkät i tre delar vilken innehöll frågor baserat på tidigare forskning. De positiva arbetsplatsminnena (80%) innehöll i huvudsak två teman, arbetsmiljö och mina arbetsuppgifter medans de negativa arbetsplatsminnena (20%) visade mer tydligt att en majoritet av minnena var kopplade till ledarskap följt av arbetsmiljö. Designen för analyserna av den kvantitativa datan var en mellanpersondesign, med två oberoende variabler Arbetsplatsminnen (positiva/negativa) och Position (chef/ej-chef) och två beroende variabler Arbetsidentitet (emotion/kognition) samt de tio fenomenologiska dimensionerna i det självbiografiska minnet. Resultaten visade att chefer jämfört med ej-chefer upplevde en starkare arbetsidentitet gällande både de emotionella och kognitiva banden. Vidare visade resultaten på signifikanta skillnader av positiva och negativt arbetsplatsminnena i tre utav de totalt tio fenomenologiska dimensionerna. Även en interaktion mellan Positiva/Negativa arbetsplatsminnen och Chef/Ej-chef på tre utav de tio fenomenologiska dimensionerna gick att utläsa. / The purpose of the study was to investigate our most important positive and negative autobiographical work-related memories of managers and non-managers related to work-related identity and workplace memory phenomenology. The study included 194 people, 124 men and 70 women in the age span 25-65. Measuring instruments for the study consisted of a survey in three parts which contained questions based on previous research. The positive work-related memories (80%) mainly contained two themes, work environment and my working duties, while the negative workplace memories (20%) showed more clearly that a majority of the memories were linked to leadership and work environment. The design for the analyzes of the quantitative data was a between-subject-design, with two independent variables Work-related memories (positive/negative) and Position (manager/non-manager) and two dependent variables Work-related self (emotion/cognition) as well as the ten phenomenological dimensions of the autobiographical memory. The results showed that managers compared to nonmanagers experienced a stronger work-related self on both the emotional and cognitive components. Furthermore, the results showed significant differences between the positive and negative work-related memories in three out of the total ten phenomenological dimensions. An interaction between Positive/Negative work-related memories and Manager/Non-manager on three out of the ten phenomenological dimensions was also red out.