Long-Term Memory

Long-term memory can last for many years or even for life. The capacity of long-term memory seems limitless, but some researchers think it consists of 50,000–100,000 chunks. The information in long-term memory mainly comes from advanced coding and processing of information in short-term memory, but some long-term memory could be formed at one go from deep impression.

In the past, it was thought that long-term memory is organized by association. In the 1930s, British psychologist Frederich Bartlett proposes that remembrance is the integration of new materials into an individual’s schema.

The information stored in long-term memory can be represented in two ways: (1) Language, whereby materials are grouped into chunks based on semantic meaning, grammatical relations, and systematic classification. (2) Mental imagery, whereby materials are organized as visual image, sound, smell, and tactile imagery. It is generally believed that the left hemisphere is predominantly responsible for...