The Star Tribune’s John Reinan talks with Augsburg Psychology Professor Bridget Robinson-Riegler about how the Great Minnesota Get-Together聽“not only entertains us, excites us and exhausts us 鈥� it makes us Minnesotans.”
鈥淥ur identity is formed by our memories. Traditions and rituals are very important in identifying who we are,鈥� said Robinson-Riegler, who specializes in the study of memory. 鈥淔amilies are based on shared experiences, and this is one of those shared experiences we have as a state. The State Fair becomes a collective experience. It gives us a sense of belonging, of togetherness.
鈥淭his is what we do as a state. It confirms our identity. It becomes who we are.鈥�
Professor Bridget Robinson-Riegler spoke with WCCO-TV about how humans recall their memories聽for the聽news station鈥檚 Good Question segment. Robinson-Riegler, who teaches in the College鈥檚 psychology聽department, explained to television viewers that its common for聽individuals to have mismemories. She commented that memories are not like tape recorders in that people聽replay them exactly as they happened. Instead, memories聽are reconstructed, so when the聽brain encodes memories, it聽encodes different pieces of different events.
David Praska wanted to be a dentist and follow in the footsteps of his uncle, a successful orthodontist. “He had this great lifestyle, and I really wanted that,” Praska says. So in high school and the first two years of college, he focused on biology. “But I was never really good at it.”