The problem with relying on long term memory

Long term memory is a funny thing. Generally, we think that we have either a very good long term memory or our perception is that it’s more akin to collecting water with a sieve: nothing sticks.

For those who think that they belong to the first category: heed this word of caution that follows.

Science tells us that many people’s long term memory is lousy in terms of accurate recall. How so? Psychiatrist Offer carried out a fascinating investigation. He surveyed a bunch of fourteen year olds in 1962 and asked them a whole load of pretty personal questions involving home life, sexuality, religion, parental discipline and general activities. That in itself is not remarkable but this next point is. He not only kept the results of the survey but then re-surveyed the same people 34 years later in 1996. The purpose was to discover how robust the long term memories were.

The results were interesting. There were significant differences between the adult memories of what happened as an adolescent and what was reported as happened as an adolescent. Accurate long term memory recall was generally no better than chance.

What’s going on that would cause such poor memory recall? The act of learning something is called consolidation. This means that the memory makes its way to long term memory. However, in recalling the memory, the brain must then reconsolidate the memory. Yes, reconsolidate the memory. Many scientists believe that the act of recalling a long term memory converts it to short term (more accurately called working memory) and that this occurs every time the long term memory is retrieved. This means that the working memory must be reconsolidated every time it’s recalled to change it back in to long term memory.

If that wasn’t bad enough, there’s another, even greater problem. In recalling the memory other memories bleed into it, as the brain actively engages in pattern matching the recalled memory with any other memories it thinks are associated with it an any way. The problem is: they may not be. The result? Long term memory is very suspect to influence.

The authors of the study made the significant conclusion that even more care is required in obtaining accurate historical information that was medical or psychological. This point could be applied to law enforcement offers (who seek to make sure witness statements are taken at the earliest opportunity after the crime is committed) and anyone requiring historically accurate information.

By the way, if we extrapolate the point about memory bleed, then the only way to prevent previous long term memories having other memories bleed into them is to not recall the long term memories in the first place! Oh, that’s helpful: not!

You can read more about the study here.

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Does it really matter what I think?

Does it really matter what I think?

The short answer is yes! The brain is ‘plastic’. Not literally plastic of course but neuroscience refers to the brain as ‘plastic’. What does this mean? By ‘plastic’ it means mouldable, changeable, constantly able to change itself. At any age.

This is a remarkable point. For years scientists didn’t believe the brain was plastic at all let alone capable of rewiring itself at any age. Neuroscientists, challenging the concept of Localisation (the belief that learning was localised to specific regions of the brain and that those regions couldn’t be altered), were laughed at, humoured or simply ignored. Please read ‘The Brain That Changes Itself’ by Norman Doidge, MD for many examples.

Brain mapping (the process by which scientists discover which dynamic areas of the brain can be responsible for thought and behaviour) successfully challenged the Localisation scientists,  but it still took many years before neuroplasticity was considered accepted theory.

I’ve studied neuroplasticity (the science of the brain constantly changing itself) reading many books on the subject, as well as writing about it in posts. The fact, as we now understand it, is this: Whatever we think about and do will wire, rewire, strengthen the wiring and weaken the wiring of connections in our brain. There is a well-known saying in the world of neuroscience and is this:

Neurones that fire together, wire together.

What this means is neurones that work together, firing their signals along the neurone axons to other neurones form connections with each other and increase the efficiency of the signal being sent. The result: we can carry out the thought or behaviour with ever greater efficiently.

That’s great. It takes less effort to carry out the process (imagine having to learn to ride a bike every day) and the thought or behaviour becomes more and more automatic.

The problem though is that the brain doesn’t stop to say: “Hang on a minute! Do we really want to be more efficient at this?” The brain strives for efficiency whatever the thought or behaviour. Thus, with the same clinical efficiency, we can learn to think more negatively, behave more inappropriately and adopt more unhealthy habits.

Fortunately, the reverse is also true. We can learn to think more positively, behave more appropriately and adopt healthy habits. It’s just a lot easier to do, think and behave in the ways that we want in the first place than it is to have to unlearn negative thought processes and behaviours first before thinking more positively and behaving more positively. Why? Because the neurones that fired together with negative thinking have become wired together, in some cases very efficiently. It takes a lot of effort to weaken their efficacy (how well they produce their result).

But this is possible. That’s the point in neuroplasticity. It doesn’t have to be that way. The brain can change. But it’s going to take hard work. A lot of hard work. William James (Victorian psychologist) commented that a fold is easy to take hold. By this he meant that once the fold has been made it’s harder for the piece of paper to fold another way. Its tendency to fold along the original fold is strong. But, unlike a piece of paper, the ‘crease in the brain’ can fade and fade and fade and the folds in the brain: the desired wiring, can form and strengthen. Romans 12:2 (a passage in the Bible) says to the effect that we can be continuously transformed by the renewing (rewiring) of our minds.

I find it interesting that St Paul, writing two thousand years ago, explained that the mind can be continuously renewed and Localisation scientists and many others besides held that the brain was fixed until relatively recently in history.

Perhaps I might start calling St Paul the Father of Neuroplasticity!

Have you thoughts and behaviours that you want to change but feel stuck and don’t know how to change for the better? Contact me.

 

Practise challenging feelings

Practise challenging #feelings.How? 

Say​:

“Hang on a minute!”

Feelings are real but feelings aren’t #facts. Seek evidence to challengewhat may well be negative, automatic assumptions.

What are your assumptions?

 

Sorry, but you can’t!

Every time your attention is shifted from one task to another, the Rule of Disengagement followed by the Rule of Activation is employed. The Rule of Disengagement requires neurons active for a specific attention task to be disengaged and the Rule of Engagement requires neurons required for the new attention task to be sought and then activated.

This results in a time delay (perhaps as much as a 10th of a second or more) as one rule delivering attention to a task is disengaged before the next rule for giving attention to a different task is activated. The time delay prevents attention multitasking! Further, if you keep switching your attention that can add up to a lot of time. If you’re driving, even a few 10ths of a second can result in a quite considerable distance being travelled. Studies confirm talking on a phone while driving increases road traffic crashes because stopping distances are considerably increased. 

If you have an efficient working memory then task shifting can occur very quickly indeed. Shifting is still not attention, however. The fact remains: attention multitasking is neurologically impossible. 

You can of course do more than one thing at a time. At this moment in time you are doing more than one thing at the same time, as you read this post, perhaps drinking a coffee while your heart, of course, beats steadily away. You might be monitoring the traffic too if you’re near a busy road like I am. However, doing more than one thing at a time and attending to more than one thing at the same time is not the same thing at all. 

Everyone – even men! – can do more than one thing at the same time. No one – not even women! – can attend to more than one thing at the same time. 

It’s time to put attention multitasking, for either sex, in the False Doctrine Box.

Men can’t multitask – and neither can women – when it comes to paying attention.

(Adapted from the sources: Medina, J. (2009). Brain Rules. Seattle: Pear Press 

Medina, J. (2014). Brain Rules Updated and Expanded. Seattle: Pear Press.)

 

Listen

Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is what it takes to sit down and  listen. – W Churchill.

Take time, today just to listen to someone. Avoid all temptations to think how you’re going to respond, let alone say anything in reply. Just listen to what they are saying. If they ask for your advice freely give it. If they don’t you have your answer already for you provided the opportunity for them to simply share.

Listening in this way is one of the hardest skills to do so it is something that we need to practise every day. The more that we truly listen the more we’ll find others will feel safe enough ‘open up’.

Remember though: listen to doesn’t mean agree with; it simply letting go of the need to prove you’re right.

 

What did you participate in today and for how long?

What did you participate in #today and for how long?

 

Act mentally strong

#Act mentally #strong.

 

A worm’s eye view

“You don’t always need a bird’s eye view. Sometimes, a worm’s eye view is what you need because it’s right in front of your face. But you need to #notice it.” S Long

 

Where’s your attention?

Your #emotional #mind will control you if you allow it. #Learn to #manage it.

 

Fix your eyes on God

“The #mind is an #infinite of #possibilities so fix your eyes on #God (not your difficulties!) and #dream the impossible dream.” S. Long