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The difference between positive emotions on memory and stressful or fearful emotions on memory

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1) Explain the difference between positive emotions on memory and stressful or fearful emotions on memory. Why do positive life experiences last in long-term memory, while stressful or fearful life experiences are often lost or buried in people's memories?

(300 words)

2) Describe the memory formation process.

(350-400 words)

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1) Explain the difference between positive emotions on memory and stressful or fearful emotions on memory. Why do positive life experiences last in long-term memory, while stressful or fearful life experiences are often lost or buried in people's memories?

Emotions are powerful to all individuals. Carlson (2010) defines emotion as "positive or negative feelings that are produced by particular situations" (p. 367). Carlson (2010) also advises readers to remember that the emotions individuals feel refers to the feelings of an individual, not his or her actual behavior. However, positive or stressful emotions affect many individual's memories.

Positive memories tend to stay within an individual's long-term memory. Why is this? The conditioned emotional response may have something to do with this phenomenon. The conditioned emotional response is defined by Carlson (2010) as "A classically conditioned response that occurs when a neutral stimulus is followed by an aversive stimulus; usually includes autonomic, behavioral, and endocrine components such as changes in heart rate, freezing, and secretion of stress-related hormones" (p. 369). When individuals experience something he or she considers pleasurable enough to make a happy memory, his or her body will react in kind. Not only do our bodies prefer to ...

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