How To Understand Memory Tests

A discussion on memory involves sublimated memory and available memory.  Memory tests are given in the case of amnesia, fugue, substance abuse, and dissociative identity disorders.  Since the purpose of a memory test for those disturbances is to test the specific type of personal memory loss, a test on personal memory or a memory assessment must include examination not only by the therapist or psychologist but also by a friend or family member.  These testers must determine personal memory loss that is related to trauma which is either due to loss of a family member or sexual abuse; or medical which is due to a blow to the head.  A memory tests works on the premise that an individual can have lost personal memory completely which will never be reversible or has lost some personal memory which is blocked by mental disorders or substance abuse.  The memory test determines the type of personal memory loss and makes a determination in its etymology.  In other words, the testers who are all connected in some way with the person being tested arrive at a conclusion as to what caused the personal memory loss and if it can ever be retrieved.

Memory tests are given by examiners who may be legal, psychiatric or therapeutic professionals involved with the person who is exhibiting personal memory loss.  In order to verify whether the loss of all personal memory is either due to a failed suicidal attempt or as a reaction to a fearful cause, like running away from war, a teacher or a friend or someone who has shared personal memories with the individual being tested needs to ask him questions and those answers will be examined by the professional psychologist conducting the memory functions during the memory assessment test.

Secondary attention tests involve asking the victim simple questions like what is 3 and 5.  If the victim fails to show the simple ability to respond to age appropriate information or repetition of information the cause may be due to another mental disorder not associated with personal memory loss.  If a person exhibiting personal memory loss is capable of learning to remember answers to questions by using memory tips then his intellectual functioning may not have been impaired whatever the cause of his personal memory loss.  But that has nothing to do with the memory assessment.

Memory functions develop in direct relationship to a person's intellectual capacity.  But personal memory which cannot be brought back in a form that can be graded involves a different function of the brain.  Amnesia that is long term and irreversible is one of the reasons for taking a battery of tests by more than one tester on situations that the victim should be able to respond to vocally.  Memory development can be terminated by medical conditions, by traumatic events or by situations which the individual is unable to process.  A memory test works by determining the cause of the personal memory loss, the extent of the loss, and a memory assessment of the possibility of its retrieval.