Editorial Review:
Memory. There may be nothing more important to human beings than our ability to enshrine experience and recall it. While philosophers and poets have elevated memory to an almost mystical level, psychologists have struggled to demystify it. Now, according to Daniel Schacter, one of the most distinguished memory researchers, the mysteries of memory are finally yielding to dramatic, even revolutionary, scientific breakthroughs. Schacter explains how and why it may change our understanding of everything from false memory to Alzheimer’s disease, from recovered memory to amnesia with fascinating firsthand accounts of patients with striking—and sometimes bizarre—amnesias resulting from brain injury or psychological trauma.
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Customer Reviews
Average Customer Rating: 
A Great Book I Remeber Reading  2008-10-03
I was required to read this for a graduate course in Cognitive Theory. I was not interested in the topic of memory, and was interested in the other course material. I was wrong. Everyone should read this book. Schacter provides a clear and well articulated story of memory research, which will broaden everyone's view on what it means to remember and more importantly what it means to be human.
Informative and revealing 2007-07-12
Make no mistake, this is an excellent read regarding memory. In many ways, however, it acts to spotlight more what we DON'T know about memory than what we do. It focuses on location of activity in the brain insofar as discussing how memories are made, rather than the nuts and bolts of HOW they are crafted. In other words, it's as if you were an observer on a hill far above a town and you, not knowing any history of transactions or how stores work, watched many people enter a building, and coming out with items. If you didn't know how monetary exchanges worked, you could still hypothecize that "something" occurred in that building that enabled people to go in empty-handed but come out loaded with goods. But you might have no idea about how money worked or how barter might work. You simply wouold have no way of really knowing what took place in those mysterious locations. So it is with Schacter's book: repeatedly he talks about the hippocampus or other location in the brain as being a spot of brain activity when memories are recalled, but that says nothing about how they are recorded. Thus, the book does not address the specifics of how immaterial subjects such as ideas could be remembered in the physical world of the brain. I for one liked the constant usage of paintings to make his points about the "fragile power" of memory--it is through painters and novelists (creators) that we can learn a great deal of the depth of power, angst, and despair that memories (or the lack thereof) can cause. Seems perfectly appropriate to me. A good read and focuses more on breadth than depth, which again, perfectly appropriate for a lay audience.
A remarkable synthesis  2007-06-18
Daniel Schacter brilliantly interweaves scientific findings, artistic representations, philosophical reflections and his own personal history into a non-stop tour de force exposition of the study of memory. Proust, Ebbinghaus, Larry Squire and Isabel Allende all find their places in this remarkable volume. An effortless, informative, and stimulating read for anyone interested in the human mind.
Interesting collection of cases to make a point. 2004-07-03
I found this book a very interesting reading, and surely learned some new facts. This book stimulated my eager to reflect upon what a delicate and intricated concept memory is. I particularly dislike all the "art" references the author makes in every chapter of the book. I really think this was an unnecessary complement that in my opinion not always makes a good pedagogic analogy. The book format was a little bit square, but I suppose that helps to order ideas in one's brain. Anyway, the book is really interesting and the cases are very well selected, though I personally don't like to rely that much on induction, but also I know that sometimes this is inevitable.
Cognitive psychology of memory 2002-03-14
this is the best review of the cognitive psychology of memory, by one of the leading experts in the field. I personally did not enjoy the artistic aspest of the book, but many say it was complementing. Now there are much better cognitive neuroscience books on memory -Kandel and Squires books, Steven Roses, among others- but as for the psychological aspects, this book stands above all others. At times it reads too much like a collection of case studies, but few would deny that lesion studies have contribuited a lot to an understanding of the brain/mind.
Most of the memory field is covered: recogntion vs. recall, implicit vs. explicit, episodic vs. procedural, short -long term, working memory, genral,emotional, semantic, etc..... but there is also a welcome and thorough discussion of false and recovered memories. In no other field can one see better the imediateimpact that cognitive psychology of memory has on legal and social issues. Schacter effectively explains everything we know about the phenomenon. As for the other themes, adequate and sufficient reviews are given. I personally would have liked a bit more of neuroscience, but it is a great read nontheless. There is also not much mention of the relationship between memory and other higher cognitive processes, like consciousness (a good place for speculation) or attention. But Schacter sticks to what is known, and does it well.
AS an introduction to any aspect of memory studies, few texts are better than this one. But I would tell anyone interested to also read other Schacter books, as well as more pure psychology and neurological texts on the subject. (see Seven Sins of Memory by the same author, Kandel and Squires Memory:from Minds to Molecules and Roses The Making of Memory among others).
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