Please tell me how to empty my brain’s memory cache

Yes, just as emptying the memory cache in your (old) PC/Mac/etc. will improve performance; deleting your old memories will improve the performance of creating new memories. At least that’s my takeaway from a recent New York Times article entitled “Older Brain Is Willing, but Too Full.”

Reporter Douglas Quenqua of the NY Times summarized a recent study revealing this issue by noting that “Learning becomes more difficult as we age not because we have trouble absorbing new inform.”

His article goes on to state that “Mice whose brains were genetically modified to resemble those of adult humans showed no decrease in the ability to make the strong synaptic connections that enable learning — a surprise to neuroscientists at the Medical College of Georgia at Georgia Regents University.”

No, I don’t want to know how they were able to genetically modify mice brains to resemble human brains…or what happened to those mice that figured out how to escape the lab.

As those of us with "senior moments" could have told the researchers, the study verified that the memory issue comes into play during adulthood. These mice were less capable of weakening connections that already existed, and that made it hard for them to form robust new long-term memories. “Think of it as writing on a blank piece of white paper versus a newspaper page,” said the lead author, Joe Z. Tsien. “The difference is not how dark the pen is,” he said, “but that the newspaper already has writing on it.”

Here’s a link to the NY Times article: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/22/science/older-brain-is-willing-but-too-full-for-new-memories.html?_r=1& 

And here’s a link to the study’s abstract as posted on Nature.com: http://www.nature.com/srep/2013/130108/srep01036/full/srep01036.html 

And here's the image credit for the visual that wonderfully captures the idea at the core of this study <a href='http://www.123rf.com/photo_13325473_dementia-disease-and-a-loss-of-brain-function-and-losing-memories-as-alzheimers-as-a-medical-health-.html'>lightwise / 123RF Stock Photo</a>

 

“Healthy Memory at Any Age Presentation”

The Chicago Area Brain Network (CABN) is sponsoring a presentation by Dr. Linda Sasser entitled Healthy Memory at Any Age. The free presentation will be given at the Sulzer Library Auditorium (4455 N. Lincoln Avenue Chicago, Illinois, USA) on Monday, September 24th at 6pm. According to CABN you will learn the characteristics of memory and how to use these to improve retention and recall.

While this is a very local event, if you’re in the area, I think you’ll find it informative, interesting and helpful.

For more information contact Maggie ( rouman.m@gmail.com )

Remembering to forget

If you’re like me, it seems that I’m awfully good at “forgetting” and not very good at “remembering”.

I’m good at forgetting:

• Where I put my glasses
• When I should return a library book
• The passwords to various websites and,
• Where I left my cup of coffee

So when somebody tells me that I need to get better at “forgetting” in order to get better at “remembering”, my first response is “huh?”

That’s part of the thesis of an article by Ingrid Wickelgren in the January/February edition of Scientific American Mind magazine.

The article, entitled “Trying to Forget”, quotes cognitive neuroscientist Benjamin J. Levy of Stanford University who said “Human memory is pretty good. The problem with our memories is not that nothing comes to mind – but that irrelevant stuff comes to mind.”

That does ring true for me.  If I try to remember where that cup of coffee is, somehow memories of where I’ve been in the house, what I need to do that day, and the fact that I need to buy more coffee get in the way of remember where the cup is.

The article goes on to state that “The act of forgetting crafts and hones data in the brain as if carving a statue from a block of marble. It enables us to make sense of the word by clearing a path to the thoughts that are truly valuable.”

The article states that a “patchwork of brain areas play roles in forgetting and remembering.” For those brain wonks out there, according to the article “in the prefrontal cortex, the dorsolateral region governs memory suppression.”

Here’s the key takeaways from the article:

• “We can will ourselves to forget; a neural circuit like the one that inhibits actions governs the ability to reject memories we neither want nor need”
• “Emerging data provide support for Sigmund Freud’s controversial theory of repression, by which unwanted memories are shoved into the subconscious.”
• “The inability to forget can impede emotional recovery in trauma victims.”
• “If you practice at rebuffing recollections, you are likely to get better at it.”

While some of this sounds like pop psychology (or maybe “poop” psychology which was how I first typed this), I am interested in improving my memory, especially my working memory. Which means that I will continue to do my Lumosity exercises so I can find my, now lukewarm, cup of coffee.

Here’s a link to the article which, of course, wants you to sign up for a subscription: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=trying-to-forget

 

I didn’t and bought the hard copy which shows that I’m a troglodyte in addition to being, at the moment, caffeine-deprived.