Chapter 1

Memory Basics – Understanding What You Have in Your Skull

Even though these are basic things, not many people know about them.

As we have said in the introduction to this guide, memory is a great tool that you can’t do without. It makes us who we are i.e., it is our identity. This makes it so crucial that you have an idea about human memory basics and how it works. In this chapter, we are going to be discussing the memory basics.

Let’s get started.

Why is Memory So Important?

Memory is so important that we can write a whole book on it. However, that is beyond the scope of this guide. Instead, we are going to list out five reasons why memory is so important in human lives.

1. Memory allows us to make sense of our existence.
2. Memory makes us connect the past to the future.
3. Memory allows us to assimilate new information.
4. Memory allows us to learn from our mistakes.
5. Memory allows us to make decisions based on sound knowledge.
6. Memory makes us want to know more about things.

The Parts of the Brain Involved with Memory and Stages (Process) of Memory Formation and Retrieval

Firstly, it is good we clarify that the whole parts of the brain work directly or indirectly in the formation of new memories. We should not view memory formation as a job of some parts of the brain. Instead, almost all parts of the brain are involved in the storage of new information.

In fact, scientists believe that memories are “distributed throughout the entire brain rather than stored in one specific area^[1]“.

The idea that memory is stored in a single compartment in the brain has been around for a while, but recent research works have questioned the authenticity of this notion, and have given more credibility to the fact that memory is widely distributed throughout the brain.

In other words, directly or indirectly, all parts of the brain are involved in memory formation/retrieval.

Memory formation is a complex process that usually involves the activities of many parts of the brain. This is probably so because a piece of information usually contains many parts. Interestingly, these parts need to be stored in different regions throughout the brain.

For example, the Spanish word “amarillo” (which means yellow in English) will be stored in the language region of the left temporal lobe. In contrast, the color it is representing will probably be stored in the occipital lobe.

Unless you are really interested in the intricacies, it might just be sufficient to know that a piece of information is stored throughout the brain. So, when next you are asked about what part of the brain stores a memory, it might just be smart to tell them that all parts of the brain do.

This is probably the best answer to give because different types of memory are stored in different parts of the brain, and a single piece of information might be stored in a number of places in your brain.

Now that you understand that memories are distributed throughout the brain; let’s now briefly discuss various stages involved in memory formation and retrieval.

Experts have broken the stages of memory into three stages:

1. Acquisition
2. Consolidation
3. Retrieval

Acquisition (Encoding)

As the name implies, this stage involves your brain taking in information. Every new memory we store will pass through this stage. Generally, a piece of information will need to be acquired and stored in short-term memory before it is moved to long-term memory. For a piece of information to be moved to long-term memory, it usually needs to be reinforced, and this leads us to the second stage.

Consolidation (Storage)

This stage involves your brain strengthening the piece of information so that it can be remembered for a long time. Generally, it is by consolidation that a short-term memory becomes a long-term memory.

Interestingly, just as we have control of the acquisition stage, we also have control of the consolidation stage. For example, paying attention and reliving a piece of information can make it to be more reinforced in our brain and boost the consolidation stage.

The purpose of storing a piece of information is to use it in the near or distant future, and this leads us to the next stage called retrieval.

Retrieval

This stage involves recalling a piece of information. This is the stage that separates a scholar from a novice. Usually, being able to retrieve a piece of information when needed defines how sharp your memory is.

Interestingly, these three stages can all be enhanced by following some guidelines. You will learn about these guidelines by reading chapters three, four, five, and eight of this guide.

Understanding the Different Types of Memory

Memory has both been categorized using the length of time and nature in which it is accessed or retrieved.

Using the length of time you recall something; we can divide memory into two types, namely:

1. Short-term memory
2. Long-term memory

On the other hand, using the nature in which the memory is recalled, i.e., whether it is recalled consciously or subconsciously, we can divide memory into two types:

1. Explicit Memory
2. Implicit Memory

Let’s now briefly explain each.

Short-term Memory

Short-term memory is the type of memory that the brain stores temporarily for a few seconds or minutes. This short-term memory stores information temporarily until it is passed to the long-term memory or forgotten.

There is an aspect of short-term memory that is worthy of mentioning, and that is working memory. Working memory comes into play when you are trying to manipulate or make sense of a piece of information while it is still in the short-term memory.

One crucial characteristic of short-term memory is that it is easily affected by distractions. To fully keep information in short-term memory for a few seconds or minutes, you need to pay attention.

So, how long does short term memory last? Experts seem to agree that short-term memory typically lasts for less than a minute. After this amount of time, your brain discards the information in the short-term memory or move it to long term memory.

It appears that if you are saving a piece of information for hours in your brain, it is no more in short term memory but long-term memory.

Long-term Memory

This is the type of memory that gets stored for a considerable length of time. Generally, those pieces of information in the short-term memory that are not forgotten make it to the long-term memory. The long-term memory is usually the type of memory that tells how brilliant one’s memory is.

In fact, most programs on how to improve human memory focus on long-term memory. Any attempt to improve one’s memory must necessarily and majorly include how to improve one’s long-term memory.

In the section above, we mentioned that based on the nature in which it is accessed, memory could also be divided into explicit and implicit memory. Let’s now briefly talk about these two types of memory.

Note: Both explicit and implicit memory are the two types of long-term memory. In other words, long-term memory is divided into explicit and implicit memory.

Explicit Memory

Explicit memory (also known as declarative memory in some quarters) is the form of memory that emanates from consciousness. Explicit memory requires a conscious effort on the part of an individual to come into play.

Examples of explicit memory events:

1. Recalling the type of dress you wore yesterday.

1. Recalling the name of countries you have been to.
2. Answering an examination question.

To learn more about explicit memory, please read this our guide titled Demystifying the Explicit Memory: A Layman’s Guide.

Implicit Memory

Implicit memory is the opposite of explicit memory, and it involves those memories we cannot consciously access.

Although we cannot consciously access implicit memory, they still affect us at a subconscious level and still affect our choices in life.

Implicit memory is the type of memory we use when performing a routine. For example, when walking from a place to another, we don’t consciously remember how to move our legs. Moving our legs while walking from a place to another is an automatic process, and it is a part of implicit memory.

Just How Much Information Can Human Brain Store

It would have been quite easy to say exactly how much information the human brain can store if our brains were like computer hard drives. Interestingly, human brains are not like the hard drives of a computer. The human brain is far more complex and developed than that.

This complexity of the human brain makes it difficult to say the exact memory capacity of a typical human brain. In other words, unless by some sort of futuristic science (that we may never have), it may be almost impossible to say exactly how much information our brain can store.

However, even if we don’t know exactly the amount of information our brain can store, we can say that you can’t fully use the memory in your brain unless there is an ill-health (like dementia).

Note: Some research works have tried to show the actual (or range of) amount of data a brain can store, but we decided not to include them here because these research works are guesstimates at best.

Another reason why it will be difficult to quote such research works is that some factors improve human memory, and one of them is exercise.^[2] So, if the brain is something you can improve, then how do you give it a fixed storage size?

If you have ever come across an article claiming to know the amount of information the human brain can store, you should treat such an article as nothing more than a fictitious scientific essay.

Age and Memory – the Relationship

Age has a profound effect on memory. In fact, it is one of the most important factors affecting our memory. Generally, human beings tend to have the best memory of their lives when they are young. The graph of memory performance and age generally somewhat looks like the one shown below.

According to scientists familiar with human brain development, the human brain does not become fully developed until early to mid-20s ^[3].

Specifically, it is said that the prefrontal cortex (the part of the brain that controls reasoning and related activities) does not fully mature until early to mid 20s ^[4].

We will like to point out that though studies reveal that the human brain becomes fully developed around age 24 or 25, there appears to be no age at which the whole brain function begins to decline.

According to an article published on Harvard.edu^[5], the notion that cognitive abilities level off around middle age and then start to gradually decline is untrue.

Studies now make us believe that while some areas of the brain usually begin to decline, other areas develop more and improve as we age ^[5].

In other words, we can’t say there is an age when the whole brain function begins to decline ^[6], rather what we know is that some parts of the brain (functions) begin to decline as we age while others improve.

The graph of brain function as we age somewhat looks like the one shown below.

As shown in the graph above, some brain functions increase while others diminish as we grow old.

That said, it is crucial we note that we are predisposed to some brain diseases as we grow old. An example of this is Alzheimer’s disease.

Why Do We Forget Things?

We all love to read a piece of information once and have it permanently engraved on our memory. Unfortunately, this is not the case in the most time. Usually, we need to reread a piece of information several times before we can remember it for a long period.

The human brain is designed in such a way that it only stores the information it deems important. If we all look at it objectively, we will all agree that life will be quite burdensome if we all vividly remember all the tiny details of everything that happens to us on a daily basis.

In addition, vividly remembering all pieces of information will make it difficult to forgive people of their wrongdoings and will also make it difficult to get over grief.

In a way, our brain is designed to forget some things so that we can navigate the hurdles of life much more easily.

In a nutshell, we forget things because our brain is built and destined not to remember everything. There appears to be nothing we can do about this.

However, there are things you can do to improve your memory so that you don’t forget crucial things in your life. Please go to chapters three, four, five, and eight of this guide to learn how to improve your memory.

References:

1. “Parts Of The Brain Involved With Memory”. Pressbooks-Dev.Oer.Hawaii.Edu, 2014, http://pressbooks-dev.oer.hawaii.edu/psychology/chapter/parts-of-the-brain-involved-with-memory/. Accessed 11 Aug 2020.
2. Godman, H. (2014). Regular exercise changes the brain to improve memory, thinking skills – Harvard Health Blog. [online] Harvard Health Blog. Available at: https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/regular-exercise-changes-brain-improve-memory-thinking-skills-201404097110[Accessed 17 Nov. 2019].
3. Citeseerx.ist.psu.edu. (2019). [online] Available at: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.497.3490&rep=rep1&type=pdf [Accessed 18 Nov. 2019].
4. Jsc.montana.edu. (2019). [online] Available at: http://jsc.montana.edu/articles/v10n18.pdf[Accessed 18 Nov. 2019].
5. Publishing, H. (2019). How memory and thinking ability change with age – Harvard Health. [online] Harvard Health. Available at: https://www.health.harvard.edu/mind-and-mood/how-memory-and-thinking-ability-change-with-age [Accessed 23 Nov. 2019].
6. Ibid.