Memory Aids

The environments that supercharge your memory.

Table of Contents

• Memory Aids
• Questions on My Mind about the Psychology of Environmental Memory Aids
• Memory Mechanics
• Long-Term Memory
• Short-Term Memory (Working memory)
• Memory → Environment Mechanics
• Environments for Remembering
• Environments for Forgetting
• Virtual Environments
• Internal Environments
• Memory Control

Questions on My Mind about the Psychology of Environmental Memory Aids

1. How can an environment impact memory retention and retrieval? Thinking about how it’s said that things can be more easily remembered in a context similar to where it was learned.
2. What makes some environments more memorable than others? Novelty, amount of time spent…
3. How can we use objects in our environments to aid memory? Like when I’m in bed and I have a thought I want to remember in the morning, so I grab something near me and toss it across the room, so that in the morning I’ll be all like “why the heck is this here?… oh yeah!”.
4. Which environments can be detrimental to memory? Air pollution, long term sensory deprivation…
5. How can we use virtual environments to aid memory?
6. How can we use imagined environments to aid memory
7. How can we use the environment to intentionally forget things
8. Why do we sometimes forget why we went into a room
9. How do stressful environments affect memory retention and retrieval
10. What’s the correlation between memory and spatial intelligence (vivid imagination)
11. How do visual memories work differently than others
12. How can we use the environment to manipulate people’s memories
13. How do flashbulb memories work
14. What are some helpful capture habits
15. How can we use a second brain to aid memory

Memory Mechanics

• What usually influences the vividity of a memory
• How are episodic and semantic memories stored in different ways
• How does intentionality affect memory storage
• Why can we remember some semantic things more easily than others
• Why are some memories retained longer than others
• How do visual memories work differently than others
• How can we use neuroplasticity to bypass dementia
• Neuroplasticity as a key to bypassing dementia. This includes making new synaptic connections by learning as many new things as possible and making as many connections as possible.
• How can neuroplasticity be measured without equipment?
• What is our memory capacity limit
• Why are some people better at remembering than others
• Theory: the very act of remembering can change our memories
• What’s the correlation between memory and attention
• It's not enough for our senses to perceive information. Our brains cannot consolidate any sensory information into a lasting memory without the neural input of attention.
• The number 1 reason for forgetting something is lack of attention.

Long-Term Memory

Short-Term Memory (Working memory)

Memory → Environment Mechanics

• How can an environment impact memory retention and retrieval
• How can the environment influence declarative vs non-declarative memory formation and retrieval
• How can the environment influence short-term vs long-term memory formation and retrieval

Environments for Remembering

• Which environments are better at aiding memory than others

Memory Flowers

Studies show that that flowers improve not only people's moods but their memory as well

• What makes some environments themselves more memorable than others
• How do novel environments affect memory retention and retrieval
• How do comforting environments affect memory retention and retrieval
• How do stressful environments affect memory retention and retrieval
• How do joyful environments affect memory retention and retrieval
• How does the temperature of our environment impact memory retrieval and storage

Environments for Forgetting

Which environments can be detrimental to memory

Unintentionally Forgetting

Why do we sometimes forget why we went into a room

Do Doorways Actually Make Us Forget Things?

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Virtual Environments

• How can we use virtual environments to aid memory

Death

• How can we use memory and environment to preserve people post-death
• Using backed up memory data after someone's death or of yourself to interact with that person

Internal Environments

• How can we use imagined environments to aid memory
• Memory palaces
• What’s the correlation between memory and spatial intelligence (vivid imagination)

Memory Control

• How can we override memory deaths through cognitive cryogenics
• How can we harness the ability we have to remember certain things like TV shows to remember other things that are important to us
• Why can't we control our memories
• How could intentional memory editing work
• How can we train our memory
• What would the benefits be of having full control over our memories
• What would the drawbacks be of having full control over our memories
• How can we use the environment to trigger emotional memories
• Can understanding our values help us to remember
• What would a minimalist memory look like

False Memories

• Why do we sometimes remember things that never actually happened
• How can we use the environment to manipulate people’s memories
• You can manipulate other people's memory recall by using suggestive words
• Example, asking witnesses about a "car wreck" as opposed to an "accident" makes it more likely they will come up with false memories of broken glass
• How do flashbulb memories work
• Flashbulb memories: memories that are burned into our brains without distortion because the original experience was so powerful.

Your Most Vivid Memories Aren't As Accurate As You Think

We all have memories that seem like they happened yesterday, but can you really trust them?Hosted by: Brit Garner----------Support SciShow by becoming a patr...



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• “What is remembering? … I know I have added to this memory every time I have thought about it, or brought it out to look at it… It has got both further away and brighter, more and less ‘real’.” — A.S. Byatt, Memory: An Anthology (2008)

Memory

• In another study, researchers showed one group of people scenes of nature that were simple, flat, and predictable. While showing another group scenes of nature with winding paths, unpredictable landscape, and obscured scenery — scenes that evoked a sense of adventure and mystery. The latter group remembered the details of the scenes more successfully. In other words, exploration activates memory.