Memory Card

With exam fever building up, Ankur Gupta kicks off a series on
understanding how memory works - and improving it

Whenever you read a book or have a conversation, the experience causes physical changes in your brain. It may be a little scary, but every time you walk away from an encounter, your brain has been altered, sometimes permanently.

Learning is life-long. But if you’re done with learning and you think that at your stage right now you don’t need to learn at all; well, you’re wrong. Our brain never stops working and fact is that it doesn’t delete anything. Each time we absorb new information, the brain continues to store it even if we’re not consciously aware that it has.

So many people, regardless of age, sex, or stature write to me talking about their memory problems.Memory loss can hit any one at any time; forgetfulness is perfectly normal. After all, it would be inefficient for your conscious brain to retain every fact and figure you’ve ever learned throughout your life.

Brain research is now uncovering how our everyday habits - what we eat, the pills we take, how we rest, and even our confidence levels have a big impact on our brain. And some of the newest strategies which will be covered in this series will help you to keep your memory sharp and agile
Remember memory is like a muscle. The more it is used, the better it gets; the more it is neglected, the worse it becomes.

So mental exercise is just as important as physical exercise for memory improvement. Acquiring a new skill, whether it’s learning a second language or taking up a new hobby, helps boost the brain’s ability to learn and remember by improving cell-to-cell (or neuron) communication.

Research conducted over a 40-year period by the University of Illinois has shown a strong, positive association between lifelong physical activity and cognitive function. Physical activity is thought to improve cognitive function by enhancing the flow of blood and oxygen to the brain. It also helps offset the negative effects of stress hormones, which are known to impair the ability to concentrate, learn, and remember. Exercise is beneficial at any age, and it’s never too late to start.

The much maligned rote learning or memorization is a surprisingly effective way to combat age-related memory loss. Researchers at the University College in Dublin recently found that elders who engaged in an intensive period of rote learning followed by an equally long period of rest showed significant improvements in memory and verbal recall.

TRY THIS EXERCISE
Do you have a list you have to remember quickly? Take the first letters of each item and form an acronym (a word formed from the initial letters or groups of letters of words in a set phrase or series of words e.g. Member of Parliament is MP). Let’s say you have to remember to send birthday cards to Manasi, Shivam, Aarti, Tulika and Indira. Yes, their first initials form the word MSATI, which does not mean anything but with a little tweaking you get MASTI. All of us like MASTI or fun, so that’s a fun easy way to remember the five names.

Or if you are going grocery shopping Milk, Bread, Onions, Tomatoes, Potatoes, Apples = MBOTPA. 

Tough? Try rearranging them - you’ve got MP-BOAT. Think of our Prime Minister jumping out of a boat to shake hands with you. Silly? Yes. But the sillier the better when it comes to remembering things. Even if you don’’t have enough letters to form a word - try to find one that comes close. PROMPT for PRMT, FAULT for FLT and so on.

You already know the items you have to remember. What you are trying to do is create a reminder - once your memory is jogged, the words will come back. When you are devising the acronym, remember to picture the items visually in your head, because visualization is a strong memory technique. This one’s known as mnemonics.

The puzzles page in most tabloids offer you an opportunity to exercise these skills. Keep practising this technique until next week when I shall present even more tips and techniques.

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Thought for the Week

“Memory is a way of holding on to the things you love, 
the things you are, the things you never want to lose.”
Kevin Arnold
Protagonist of the television serial : The Wonder Years
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First published in Gray Matter - The Hindustan Times