Patterns of memory functioning

Numerous studies of memory have led to the identification of laws and patterns in the functioning of memory. The German researcher G. Ebbinghaus, back in the last century, deduced a whole series of memorization patterns:

Life events that make a strong emotional impression on a person can be immediately remembered firmly and for a long time.

Events that are not interesting enough can be experienced dozens of times and not be remembered.

Close attention improves memory.

A person can very accurately reproduce events and not realize it and, conversely, make mistakes, but be sure that he is reproducing them correctly. There is no direct relationship between fidelity and confidence in accuracy.

Increasing the memorized series reduces the amount of memorized information. To memorize an increased series, more repetitions are needed to memorize. For example, a person reproduces 6 syllables after memorizing once. He is given a series of 12 syllables, in this case he can reproduce 6 only after 14-16 repetitions (26 syllables - 30 repetitions).

When memorizing a long series, the beginning and end are best reproduced (“edge effect”).

Repetitions of memorized material in a row are less productive for its memorization than the distribution of such repetitions over a certain period of time (several hours, days).

What a person is especially interested in is remembered without any difficulty.

Rare, strange, unusual impressions are remembered better than familiar, frequently occurring ones.

The founder of psychoanalysis 3. Freud described the mechanism of forgetting, which is based on the motive of reluctance to remember. An example of motivated forgetting, according to Freud, are cases when a person involuntarily loses, puts somewhere things related to what he wants to forget, and forgets about these things so that they do not remind him of psychologically unpleasant events. The tendency to forget unpleasant things is widespread in life.

Within the framework of Gestalt theory, such a pattern of memory has been identified as remembering unfinished actions. If people are given a series of tasks and allowed to complete some of them and leave others unfinished, it turns out that subjects are subsequently 2 times more likely to remember unfinished tasks than completed ones. This is explained by the fact that when receiving a task, the subject has a need to complete it. If the task is not completed, the need is not satisfied. Motivation affects memory by storing traces of unfinished actions. When recalling tasks, unfinished ones are named first, therefore, what meets current and not fully satisfied needs is remembered more firmly and reproduced faster.

When organizing the learning of material and memorizing the necessary information, it is necessary to take into account the existing patterns in the functioning of memory.

Development of memory in human ontogenesis

Like any mental function of a person, memory develops as the individual socializes. From early childhood, the process of memory development occurs in several directions:

firstly, mechanical memory is gradually replaced and supplemented by meaningful or logical memory;

secondly, at first, direct memorization over time turns into indirect, associated with the active and conscious use of various mnemotechnical techniques and means for memorizing and reproducing material;

Thirdly, involuntary memorization and reproduction, which dominates in childhood, in an adult person turns into voluntary processes (self-regulating, subordinate to will and self-control).

Special studies of memory development were carried out by A. N. Leontiev. He experimentally showed how one mnemonic process - direct memorization - with age fits into another, indirect one. This occurs due to the child’s assimilation of increasingly sophisticated stimuli-means of memorizing and reproducing material. The use of aids for memorization turns direct, immediate memorization into indirect.

A variety of objects can serve as stimulus-means: fingers, notches, memory knots, crosses on the hand. These items serve as a reminder. As the child develops, external stimulus objects are replaced by internal stimuli (images, feelings, associations, ideas, thoughts). In the process of forming internal means of memorization, speech plays a central role. There arises the ability to instruct yourself in such a way when memorizing, so that later, when the need arises, you can accurately remember. Memory becomes arbitrary and independent of external conditions.

The development of arbitrary logical memory requires for its emergence not only a large amount of information, but also mastery of a certain system of mental operations, with the help of which one can generalize the input material in a multi-stage manner and move on to the use of symbolic languages ​​of higher levels.

In the process of transition from external to internal stimuli and increasing the variety of mental operations, higher voluntary logical memory develops (Fig. 7).

Ticket 23.

Memory training. Methods of memorization and techniques for improving memory.

To begin with, it is worth noting that we often train our memory and attention using various everyday situations in everyday life. We remember what we want to buy in a store, try to remember the birthdays of relatives, friends and acquaintances, retell the contents of a recently read book or textbook - all this and much more is good memory training. However, the use of special exercises gives us the opportunity to concentrate on the specific goal of developing a certain ability of our memory.

When talking about memory training, it is important to understand that it is almost impossible to directly train a specific ability to memorize material. Memory always develops in close connection with our attention, perception, thinking, sense organs and other phenomena of human nature.

In order for memorization to be successful, the following provisions should be adhered to: 1) make a commitment to memorization; 2) show more activity and independence in the process of memorization (a person will remember the path better if he moves independently than when he is accompanied); 3) group the material according to meaning (drawing up a plan, table, diagram, graph, etc.); 4) the process of repetition when memorizing should be distributed over a certain time (a day, several hours), and not in a row. 5) new repetition improves memorization of previously learned; 6) arouse interest in what is being remembered; 7) the unusual nature of the material improves memorization.

Auditory Memory Training

Exercise 1: Reading aloud

Exercise 2. Poems

Exercise 3. Eavesdropping

Visual memory training

Exercise 1. Schulte tables

As you know, Schulte tables are useful for developing speed reading. They perfectly train peripheral vision, attention and observation, and if you time it, you will have an incentive to beat your personal record, which will add additional excitement to practicing with these tables.

Schulte tables are useful not only for developing speed reading skills, but also for training visual memory. When searching for sequential numbers in a table, our vision instantly fixes several cells. As a result, the location of not only the desired cell is remembered, but also cells with other numbers.

Exercise 2. Photographic memory training (Aivazovsky method)

This method of training photographic memory is named after the famous Russian-Armenian marine painter Ivan Konstantinovich Aivazovsky (Ayvazyan). Aivazovsky could mentally stop the movement of a wave for a moment, transferring it to the canvas so that it did not seem frozen. Solving this problem was very difficult; it required the artist to have a good development of visual memory. To achieve this effect, Aivazovsky watched the sea a lot, closed his eyes and reproduced what he saw from memory.

Exercise 3. Playing matches

The game of remembering matches is not only useful, but also a convenient way to train visual memory. Throw 5 matches on the table and within a few seconds remember their location. After this, turn away and try using the other 5 matches to make the same picture on another surface.

Exercises 4. Roman room

As already noted, the Roman room method is very useful for structuring memorized information. However, this famous technique can also be used to train visual memory. So, when memorizing information using the Roman room method, try not only to remember the sequence of objects and the data assigned to them, but also the details, shapes and colors of these objects. These attributes can also be assigned additional memorized images. As a result, you will remember more information, and at the same time train your visual memory.

Memorization methods are techniques that help remember certain new information.

Multiple repetition. For example, repeated repetition of a poem out loud.

A mnemonic device is a little saying or rhyme for the first letter of each word. For example, Every Hunter Wants to Know Where the Pheasant Sits.

An acronym is a new word made from the first letters of each word. For example, SKIF, MAG, OKO.

Composition is memorization that is based on some rule or principle. For example, in alphabetical order, by size, by color, by purpose, etc.

Or, for example, for the convenience of remembering the tasks of the day, it makes sense to have private tasks, where you can collect and package them into the main Tasks of the day. It’s difficult to remember 30 things in one head, but if you arrange them correctly, everything becomes easier. Memory normally holds about seven objects, so it is optimal if the daily schedule contains up to 7 main tasks, and each task can consist of several (up to 7) tasks. You even have a reserve...

Associative method of memorization - visual association, consonant association or other psychological clues.

Abbreviation - USSR, MosKomPechat

Use of sounds, colors, etc. For example, a fire siren, yellow handles for the operator, etc.

Ticket 24

Concept and functions of attention. The connection between attention and other mental processes, consciousness and behavior.

General idea of ​​attention. Types and properties of attention.

Definition and basic properties of attention. Classification of types of attention

Basic definitions of attention. V. Wundt: attention is the subjective side of the phenomena of consciousness, apperception is their objective result. Attention is a process of apperception accompanied by a feeling of internal effort. E. Titchener: attention - sensory clarity. James: attention is biased, carried out through mental activity, the possession in a clear and precise form of one of several simultaneously possible series of thoughts (selection). Attention is a necessary universal mental process; it exists everywhere, but its content and specificity are very difficult to identify. To do this, it must be considered at the level of activity as a whole. 2 main characteristics of attention: 1) the need for selection of material, 2) the formation of past experience (to preserve it, you need to keep it in consciousness for some time, the subject’s activity is necessary). Attention as an effort of consciousness that has a limited resource. Attention is the presence of a special activity of the subject, equipped with special means and associated with the effort of the subject. V. always implies activity, B - active selection; this is the formation and manifestation of a receptive attitude towards one object while ignoring others.; this is a state of clarity and distinctness of the content of consciousness; this is the willingness to notice something. in the behavior of another and react to it; this is the direction and concentration of mental activity. focus (direction - selection and maintenance of a given activity; concentration - distraction from other activities and deepening in a given activity); this is special. control activities (ideal, reduced, automation); a phenomenal and product manifestation of the work of the Vedas. organizational level activity ÞÞ in is always choice, selection and selectivity, as well as concentration and the fight against distractions.

Saints. Attention as a state (a fixed position in a certain state or a certain state) and as a process (a total of sequential stages that lead to a certain state) named after. diff. St. Attention as states 4 saints:

2. degree (intensity)

Volume 3 (number of simple impressions or ideas clearly understood at the moment)

4. concentration (concentration) here is the volume and degree of ext. in reverse dependencies. Listen. as a process: 1. fluctuations - non-producible. changes in attention 2. distraction - unpronounced. change in direction, 3. shifts - cont. change volume, 4. switch. - deliberate change of direction, 5 stability - def. vibration frequency and shifts, 6. distribution - possible. direction V. at the same time for several objects. 7. mobility - rapid change. direction, degree, volume.

Kinds:

1) James identified 3 types: 1. by object of consciousness (sensory and mental);

2 affective (immediate - if the object is interesting in itself and derivative - in connection with another object.);

3. passive. (we pay attention to him rather due to his nature than the power of influence on his innate desire and, due to this, acquired attractiveness) and active. \ voluntary (always apperceptively, we make efforts to direct).

Unprov. at: home wake-up. power is not in the subject, but in the object and the person. listen nezav. from awareness goals and their frequency. passive . Types: a. forced (innate), forced objects with defined characteristics (intensity, rhythmic repetition, unexpected); b. involuntary (depending on individual experience and fuss in the process of adjusting, and objects fall into attention during the period when needs are actualized); V. habitual (head of purpose and education).

Free: excellent. its sign is consciousness. intention to turn to something. listen A. volitional (conflict with the chosen object and unproduced tendencies; arising feeling of tension); b. expectant (if a person is warned and waits); V. spontaneous (volitional transformation into new form).

2) another classification.: 1.. selective (analyzed in terms of action of several objects. By modality - visual....). Selective different from focusing (we adapt to someone’s answer of what to do with this stimulus), by the fact that we concentrate. at the exit to the room. sign. 2. distributed (simultaneous series of actions); 3. continuous (long and monotonous tasks)

3) Otherclass. 1) by subject, 2) by function, as the process of solving a problem; 3) by genesis.

(1) the substantive content of the activity requiring attention. W. James: types of attention in connection with cognition: a) perceptual attention - observation (perception); b) intellectual attention - insight (thinking). Any activity is involuntarily accompanied by a stream of consciousness, which allows you to control the execution of actions - executive attention. (2) A. Smirnov: any activity is accompanied by a mnemonic orientation. Task: a) goal and effort to achieve it - involuntary and voluntary processes; b) means – direct and indirect processes; c) role in the process of information processing (cognitive information) - P. Ya. Galperin: function of attention - control. Attention is a movement of mental control, automated control. (3) N. F. Dobrynin: functional criteria for levels of development: 1) presence of a goal - involuntary and voluntary attention; 2) availability of funds – direct and indirect. Levels: 1) passive (natural - following the object); 2) VPF (activity); 3) post-voluntary (personal activity).

.ATTENTION. TYPES AND PROPERTIES OF ATTENTION.

Attention- the direction and concentration of consciousness on any object, providing its clearest reflection.

In the nervous system, under the influence of an external or internal system, a focus of excitation arises, which for a certain time dominates other areas and dominates. This principle of dominance underlies the physiological mechanisms of attention.

1. Based on human activity in organizing attention, there are 3 types:

· free– controlled by a conscious goal, it is closely related to the will of a person, the main function is the active regulation of the course of mental processes;

· Involuntary– the simplest and most genetically original, it arises and is maintained regardless of the goals facing a person;

· Post-voluntary- this is focusing on an object, due to its value for the individual.

2. By object location:

· External

· Internal

Properties of attention:

1. attention span– measured by the number of objects that can be captured by attention in a very limited period of time (4-6 objects);

2. distribution of attention– is expressed in the fact that a person can keep several objects in the spotlight at the same time;

3. switching– intentional transfer of attention from one object to another;

4. sustainability– duration of attracting attention to the same object (15-20 minutes);

5. abstraction.

Personality traits related to attention:

· inattention;

· attentiveness;

· absent-mindedness (imaginary and real);

· observation.

.Theories of attention.

Basic theories of attention.

V. can be defined as the readiness on the part of the body to perceive the stimuli surrounding it . Historically, the concept of V. occupied a central place in the field of psychology. In the XIX century - beginning. XX centuries Representatives of functionalist and structuralist schools of psychology considered V. the central problem, although they emphasized different aspects of it.

Functionalists With They brought to the center the selective nature of V. as an active function of the body, mainly. on his motivational state. Thus, recognizing that V. sometimes may. passive and reflexive, they focused on its arbitrary aspects and on the fact that it is V. that determines the content of the experience received by the body.

Structuralists , against, considered V. as a state of consciousness, which consists of increased concentration and results in clarity of impressions. Thus, they made a choice in favor of studying the conditions that led to cmax, the salience of the object of consciousness or the clarity of perception.

Gestalt psychologists, associationists, behaviorists and psychoanalysts were tend to ignore V. altogether when constructing their theories, at best assigning him an insignificant role. Unfortunately, during all these years of irreconcilable struggle between theorets. directions in psychology for research. V. has done relatively little.

Many modern theories of attention assume that the observer is always surrounded by many cues. The capabilities of our nervous system are too limited to sense all these millions of external stimuli, but even if we detected all of them, the brain would not be able to process them, since our information processing capacity is also limited. Our senses, like other means of communication, work quite well if the amount of information processed is within their capabilities; When overloaded, a failure occurs. The British scientist Broadbent was the first to develop a holistic theory of attention in foreign psychology. This theory, calledmodel with filtration , was associated with the so-called single-channel theory and was based on the idea that information processing is limited by channel capacity, as stated in the original theory of information processing by Claude Shannon and Warren Weaver.

D. Broadbent wrote in his acclaimed book “Perception and Communication” that perception is the result of work information processing systems with limited bandwidth. Essential to Broadbent's theory was the idea that the world contains the possibility of receiving a much larger number of sensations than can be captured by human perceptual and cognitive abilities. Therefore, in order to cope with the flow of incoming information, people selectively direct attention only to some signs and “detach” from the rest.

T. Ribot proposed the so-called"motor theory of attention" », according to which movements play the main role in attention processes. It is thanks to their selective and targeted activation that concentration and strengthening of attention on an object occur, as well as maintaining attention on this object for a certain time. A similar idea about the physiological mechanism of attention was expressed by A. A. Ukhtomsky. He believed that the physiological basis of attention is a dominant focus of excitation, which intensifies under the influence of extraneous stimuli and causes inhibition of neighboring areas.

Modern Russian psychologists became the first to study the orienting reflex, or an indicative reaction, which consists of a cluster of physiological changes occurring in the body in response to changes in its environment. It is believed that these changes are physiological correlates of attention. These correlates include changes in brain electrical activity and skin electrical activity, pupil dilation, skeletal muscle tension, increased cerebral blood flow, and changes in posture. The orienting reflex leads to increased stimulation reception and improved learning. The work begun by Russian psychologists was continued in the USA. In particular, studies have been conducted on individual differences in the strength of the orienting reaction and the accompanying circumstances of such differences.

As a result of the workneurophysiologists and neuroanatomists , such as Hernandez-Peon et al., was found in the brain stem diffuse structure, called the reticular formation, edges, apparently mediates the processes of excitation, V. and selection of stimuli. Research reticular formation, also called. the reticular activating system, as well as its connections with other important regulatory systems of the brain, provided the basis for physiology. explanations of the influence of motivation, sleep, sensory input, learning, as well as endogenous and exogenous chemicals. substances for the process B.

Voluntary and involuntary attention.

ATTENTION INVOLVED- the simplest and genetically original. It has a passive character, because it is imposed on the subject by events external to the goals of his activity. It arises and is maintained regardless of conscious intentions, due to the characteristics of the object - novelty, strength of influence, correspondence to current needs, etc. The physiological manifestation of this type of attention is an indicative reaction.

ATTENTION ARBITRARY- is directed and supported by a consciously set goal, and therefore is inextricably linked with speech. Voluntary attention is spoken of if the activity is performed in line with conscious intentions and requires volitional efforts on the part of the subject. It is distinguished by its active nature, complex structure, mediated by socially developed ways of organizing behavior and communication; origin is related to work activity. In conditions of difficult activity, it involves volitional regulation and the use of special techniques for concentrating, maintaining, distributing and switching attention.

Ticket 25.

Positive and negative effects of attention. Criteria for attention.

The phenomenon of inattention. Poetic, professorial and student absent-mindedness. Hyperattention. Absorption. Flow experience. Negative effects of attention

The phenomena of inattention include: absent-mindedness, errors of attention and phenomena of selective (directed) inattention. Errors of inattention - an incorrectly performed or missed action, an inability to notice an important event or object - may be the result of absent-mindedness or selective inattention. The phenomena of selective inattention, stable over time, like absent-mindedness, are distinguished by the fact that errors of attention are stably limited to one of the spheres of reality or a person’s own behavior and are not observed in relation to other objects and events.

Poetic, professorial absent-mindedness. If you ask a physicist, he will remember Isaac Newton, who “boiled” a clock for tomorrow instead of an egg. The chemist will think of the famous scientist, Ivan Kablukov, who always signed himself as Kabluk Ivanov.

An example of poetic absent-mindedness is the writer Andrei Bely. There is a well-known story when, upon arriving at one of the St. Petersburg editorial offices, he forgot to take off his galoshes. It would seem like a trifle, but Bely could not resist and composed almost an ode to poetic absent-mindedness, where he shamed a certain N.V. Valentinov, who drew attention to this.

Let us highlight the characteristics of behavior and attention characteristic of these absent-mindedness. First of all, this is a lack of reaction or an inadequate reaction to external influence due to excessive concentration on one’s own thoughts or on the task at hand. Habitual actions or even entire chains of actions are preserved, however, there is no feedback about the progress of their implementation and about possible changes in the environment.

Student absent-mindedness. You don’t have to look far for an example of this absent-mindedness. Look into any classroom. There is always a restless student who fidgets and pulls his pigtails. The attention of such a student is characterized by increased “interference immunity”: it is excessively mobile, scattered, and susceptible to distraction. As soon as the slightest stimulus appears, attention is immediately directed to it. Or a jackdaw flying by, a noise outside the window, a teacher’s untied shoelace. This attention has two sides. First: high distractibility. Secondly weak concentration. This is perhaps the main problem of modern educational psychology.

Absorption (absorption) is a phenomenon of extreme attention that Ribot identified. such attention is passive and reactive: a person does not control it, but only reacts to what is happening around him. What is happening may turn out to be so fascinating that all he can do is open his mouth and “absorb” everything he sees and hears. Attention to the type of absorption may lead to complete cessation of activity.

Flow experience. The phenomenon of extreme attention can also include a state of extreme involvement in an activity, when a person is attentive to something that he previously had to work on without effort. For example, a schoolboy is completely immersed in the game, but once upon a time he had to spend a lot of time studying its rules and keys. And once such an “immersion” has occurred, parents have to work hard to “reach out” to their child.

A similar phenomenon is American. psychologist Csikszentmihalyi designated it as flow experience, into which we dive headlong and allow us to be carried in the right direction. It is observed when a person has nothing outside to distract him and can completely immerse himself in his favorite activity.

Flow Experience

In recent years, scientists have been attracted by an extremely striking phenomenon associated with the phenomenon of all-encompassing total attention - experience of "flow". The experience of “flow” (M. Csikszentmihalyi, 1990) is associated with the implementation of activities that give the subject pleasure in itself, regardless of direct dependence on its final result. Activities of this kind include play, meditation, inspiration, love experiences, etc. Many people who are asked why they spend time and money on practically useless activities, sometimes even associated with the risk of life (for example, climbers, divers, racers), answer that they do this precisely in order to achieve a state of complete immersion in the activity or, in other words, maximum intense attention.

Probably, like any normal person, I have had the experience of flow. This state has been associated with falling in love more than once! If I love, then strongly, if I feel, then to the fullest. I’m probably a maximalist in life, which is probably why I completely immerse myself in any process. In this process, my attention is focused as much as possible on one object. In my opinion, the experience of flow can also include your favorite activity, which completely draws you into its depths, and you forget about time. This is of great interest to you. In my case, these are poems and paintings. Of course, I myself am not a great artist or poet! But, watching and feeling the creativity of other people, I also emotionally and strongly experience these emotions, get involved in the very essence and create something new, my own!!!

Negative effects of attention.

First of all this deautomation– destruction of previously automated activities by paying attention to individual components. Bernstein cited the parable of the centipede as an example. To which the evil toad turned and asked which leg she starts moving from. Thinking about this, the centipede could not take a single step.

Another negative effect - semantic satiation effect. (James) if you look carefully at the same word and repeat it, then it will soon lose its meaning for us. This is the same in relation to our feelings: trying to pay attention to an emotion, it immediately disappears.

The following effect of inattention: Failure of parallel activities. Attention cannot be enough for everything, and if something requires more of it, then there is less left for the rest. For example, if some question distracts a girl from knitting, which she is busy with, then knitting is definitely not mastered enough by her.

Gippenreiter. Criteria (signs) of attention.

I. Classical psychology of consciousness: clarity and distinctness of the contents of consciousness that are in the field of attention (phenomenal, subjective criterion). There are also optional subjective criteria of attention: the experience of effort, the emotion of interest.

II. Productive criterion (objective). The quality of the cognitive (thinking, perception) or executive product increases in the presence of attention.

III. Mnemonic criterion. It is classified as productive, but its peculiarity is that there is always memory when there is attention (a by-product of any attentive action).

IV. External reactions. Facial expressions, posture, turning the head, fixing the eyes, etc. Psychophysiological correlates: EEG, GSR, pupillary reflex, etc.

V. Selectivity criterion. Only the necessary information is selected. When performing 2 or more actions, some are performed automatically.

Ticket 26 Studies of attention in classical psychology of consciousness (W. Wundt, E. Titchener, W. James). The problem of attention in Gestalt psychology (K. Koffka, V. Koehler, P. Adams).

Focus on Wundt's theoretical and empirical studies. The central problem of Wilhelm Wundt's research was the distinction between the phenomena of attention and consciousness. To do this, he used the metaphor of the visual field. The most clearly perceived content is located in the focus of the visual field, less clearly - distributed on its periphery.

According to Wundt, attention is one of the characteristics or properties of consciousness. Wundt's merit is the measurement of the volume of consciousness. To measure the volume of consciousness, he used a melodic series, including a different number of bars. He asked subjects to listen to a series. The measures could be of varying degrees of complexity: two-beat, three-beat, etc. The series were presented sequentially. The subjects had to determine whether they were the same or not. Moreover, the subjects gave correct answers even for eight two-part series. However, not all melodies were perceived by them clearly and distinctly. The tact perceived at the moment stood out with greater clarity, the next one was less distinct, and so on until the sensation completely disappeared.

Wundt suggested that only the beat perceived at a given moment is in the focus of consciousness, and all others are held due to associative connections with the focus. Presenting subjects with matrices with a random set of letters or isolated sounds that they could not combine into measures, he determined that the attention span was equal to 6 complex elements. To describe the content of consciousness and attention, Wundt used the terms proposed by G. Leibniz: “perception” and “apperception.” He called perception the entry of content into consciousness, apperception - focusing attention on a specific object, i.e. its entry into the focus of consciousness. According to Wundt, our ability to become aware is not constant and depends on the nature of the material we perceive. If we perceive a set of random elements, the volume of consciousness and attention coincide. The boundary of consciousness becomes the boundary of attention (attention = consciousness). If we have in front of us a stimulus that consists of many interconnected elements, then the apperceptible (that which is in focus) and the perceived (that which goes beyond the limits of attention) merge into a single whole. In this case, consciousness “expands” (consciousness > attention), and apperception performs a connecting function between the elements of consciousness.

. Attention in Titchener studies. Edward Titchener basically shared Wundt's views, using the same phenomenological criterion - the criterion of clarity - to isolate attention as a phenomenon of consciousness. Defining the essence of attention comes down to identifying it with the property of sensation to be clear. E. Titchener introduces the concept of “level of consciousness” and “wave of attention.” The stream of consciousness occurs at two levels: the upper represents clear processes. the lower one is the “level of vagueness” of consciousness. E. Titchener is credited with posing the problem of the genesis of attention. He was the first in the history of attention psychology to pose this problem and try to solve it. They identified three stages of attention development and three corresponding genetic forms of attention.

1) Primary attention is the earliest stage of attention development.

2) Secondary attention is active, voluntary attention accompanied by volitional effort. 3) Derivative primary attention - attention in which the stimulus gains an undeniable victory over its competitors. This is a period of mature and independent activity. E. Titchener emphasizes that the three stages of attention development he described and its corresponding genetic forms reveal differences in complexity, but not in the nature of the experience itself, which represents one type of mental process. Thus, E. Titchener, like W. Wundt, identifies the criterion of clarity of consciousness as a phenomenological criterion of attention; the clarity of sensation to which he reduces the essence of attention depends on the “predisposition” of the subject’s NS, an explanation for which he does not give.

Attention as selectivity of consciousness (W. James). William James. The central idea is the idea of ​​selectivity (selectivity) of consciousness associated with the limited volume of consciousness. Describing the phenomenon of “distraction of attention,” he uses the definition of “dim background of consciousness” and clear consciousness - concentrated attention. At the same time, to the criterion of clarity in the description of the phenomenon of attention, he adds the criterion of selectivity (selectivity) of consciousness. William James made a significant contribution to the development of ideas about the forms of attention. They proposed several classifications of types of attention.

A. By object of attention: 1) sensory attention, the object of which is sensation; 2) intellectual attention - its object is the reproduced representation. B. According to the indirectness of the attention process: 1) direct attention - its object in itself is emotionally attractive, directly interesting; 2) indirect attention - its object in itself is uninteresting, but is associated associatively with an emotionally attractive object - this is apperceptive attention. B. By the presence of volitional effort: 1) passive, reflex, involuntary, not accompanied by volitional effort; 2) active, voluntary, accompanied by volitional effort. W. James's idea of ​​the variety of forms of attention was a major turning point in clarifying the question of the main types (forms) of the existence of attention.

The problem of attention in Gestalt psychology and associative psychology.

Attention is part of the perceptual process; some force within the integral field (K. Koffka, 1922). And our perception is determined by the laws of organization of the sensory field: the laws of proximity, cohesion of space, pregnancy, good continuation, etc. In this description there is no room left for attention at all - everything happens without its participation, as well as without the participation of the subject of perception. However, this understanding of attention and its place in the process of perception is not the only one in Gestalt psychology. E. Rubin questioned the very fact of the existence of attention (1925). And in 1958, V. Koehler and P. Adams published a work in which they analyzed the results of their experimental research, which led them to the conclusion that attention strengthens, intensifies the process of perception, making it selective. Representatives of English empirical psychology - associationists - did not include attention at all in the system of psychology; for them there was neither a person nor an object, but only ideas and their associations; therefore there was no attention for them.

Attention as the “power of the Ego” in Gestalt psychology.

Gestalt psychology considers objectivity as the main characteristic of psychological processes, which is clearly represented in the phenomenon of isolating a figure or object from the background. The concept of structure (gestalt), reflecting the objective integrity of an object and having an advantage over its elements, constitutes the main core of the concept. The formation of a gestalt is subject to its own laws, such as the grouping of parts in the direction of maximum simplicity, proximity, balance, the tendency of any mental phenomenon to take on a more definite, distinct, complete form, etc.

Gestalt psychologists imagined attention as one force factor influencing the psychological processes of the subject. “Attention is a force emanating from the Ego and directed towards an object (the case of voluntary attention), or a force emanating from the object in the direction of the Ego (the case of involuntary attention),” wrote K. Koffka. Such attention to the process of attention presupposes its consideration as one of the factors included in the process of structuring the phenomenal field.

The human psyche was understood by Gestalt psychologists as an integral phenomenal field (the totality of what is experienced by the subject at a given moment), which has certain properties and structure. The main components of the phenomenal field are figure and ground.

The influence of attention on the threshold for dividing figures was shown experimentally in an experiment by V. Koehler and P. Adams. The subjects were shown a white shield with dots on it. In the case when the distance between the points vertically and horizontally was equal, the shield was perceived as evenly filled with dots. From trial to trial, the horizontal distance remained constant, and the vertical distance gradually decreased. One group was presented only with a shield (attention condition), while the other group was shown cut-out paper figures against the backdrop of a shield, which they had to describe (no attention condition).

After completing the task, subjects were asked whether they saw dots or columns. It turned out that with attention, in order for a scattering of points to begin to be perceived as vertical columns, the vertical distance between the points should become 1.7 times less than the horizontal distance between the points. In the absence of attention, this distance should become three times smaller. In other words, under conditions of attentive perception, the threshold for dismembering the figure becomes significantly lower (the distance between the points at the moment when they are already perceived as “columns should be greater”) than in the case when the shield acts as a background.

Thus, in that part of the field to which attention is directed, the principles of its organization described by Gestalt psychologists (in this case, the principle of proximity) operate with weaker stimulation.

The long shadow of the past. Memorial culture and historical politics Assman Aleida

Storage and functional memory

If living memories are irretrievably lost with the departure of their bearer, there is a chance for material traces of culture to have a “second life” in institutions outside the previous functional context60. What finds its place in museums, libraries and archives, is collected, stored and cataloged there, gets a chance for an extraordinary extension of its existence. However, the prerequisites and conditions for the emergence of cultural memory are still very incompletely described in this way. After all, cultural memory is created not only retroactively, through the collection and preservation of objects of the past, but also through the purposeful selection and formation of what should be transferred from our days to the future for an indefinite period. To better understand both of these aspects of cultural memory, it is necessary to distinguish in the dynamics of cultural memory between the “cumulative memory” and the “functional memory” of a society. This difference reflects the contradictory structure of memory, in which remembering and forgetting are combined, mutually penetrating each other. After all, much of what we forget is not lost forever, but turns out to be only temporarily inaccessible61. What in individual memory sinks into the indistinguishability of oblivion can, under certain circumstances, resurface again, just as the madeleine cake awakened memories of the deeply forgotten in Proust’s lyrical hero. Often we call oblivion just a latent memory to which we have lost the password; if it is found by chance, then a piece of a sensually perceptible past unexpectedly returns to us. We can talk about such a return when certain elements that have settled in the cumulative memory are updated in a new way in consciousness, and, on the contrary, it is these preserved elements that form the current thought. In the words of Walter Benjamin, traces of the past, in contact with present thought, generate a state of “readability.” More and more new types of “selective affinity” are emerging between the ongoing present and past eras. The same role that, according to Proust’s definition, “involuntary memory” (“mémoire involontaire”) plays for the individual, the archive or cumulative memory plays for cultural memory: a repository for latent memories whose hour has already passed or has not yet come. Corresponding to Proustian involuntary memory at the cultural level are material relics of past eras, already out of use and not integrated into the present, but still existing somewhere. After all, what at a certain point in time society discards, deprives of its attention and what it neglects is not yet completely lost and forgotten; material traces can be collected and preserved for another era, when they will be rediscovered and reinterpreted.

The difference between cumulative and functional memory can be clearly demonstrated by the example of an art museum, which exhibits a certain set of paintings in its permanent exhibition, fixing it in the minds and memory of visitors; however, the museum storehouses contain a much larger number of works of art from various genres and eras. Such a museum performs two clearly distinguishable functions: firstly, it is a function of value canonWith its orientation reflecting and shaping tastes, and secondly, this is a function of historical archive. Preservation and conservation of things is only one side of cultural memory; its other side consists of strict selection, active evaluation and individual development. Functional memory suffers from a constant lack of space. What gets there - from the canon of biblical texts to the canon of literary classics - undergoes the most severe selection. The “canonization” procedure, which, along with selection, also implies the fixation and auratization of texts or paintings, provides them with a place not only in the passive, but also in the active memory of society. After all, canonization also means accepting transhistorical obligations to continue readings and interpretations again and again. Therefore, despite the dynamics of accelerated innovation, what is included in functional memory remains in the programs of educational institutions, in the repertoire plans of theaters, in museum halls, in concert or publishing programs. What has taken its place in the functional memory of society lays claim to ever new productions, exhibitions, ever new readings, interpretations, and discussions. Such preservation of cultural artifacts and access to them leads to the fact that some of them do not become alien, completely silent, but are revitalized from generation to generation through contact with changing modernity.

Cumulative memory also stores only a small part of the cultural heritage. She, too, is always a product of oblivion; and here the mechanisms of selection, depreciation, destruction and loss are triggered. But it provides much more space and does not make such strict selection, so the storage memory of libraries and archives ends up being filled to the limit. Such fullness of the accumulator, as Montaigne and later Nietzsche noted, is the other side of its emptiness. Conservation and preservation are a necessary prerequisite for cultural memory; however, only individual perception, evaluation and assimilation of stored materials, as occurs through the media, cultural and educational institutions, make it cultural memory. Cumulative memory is an archive of culture, where a certain part of the material traces of the past is stored, which have lost their living and contextual connection with their eras. Visual or verbal documents become mute witnesses of the past because the narratives and memories associated with them are lost. These storage memory contents differ sharply from cultural artifacts stored in functional memory, since the latter are especially protected from the processes of oblivion and alienation. Of course, the institutionally ensured durability of artifacts does not exclude their return to cultural memory. This occurs due to the fact that the border between functional and storage memory is not hermetically impenetrable; this border can be overcome in both directions. Elements of functional memory, which is activated by will and consciousness, constantly go into the archive if interest in them wanes; and from the “passive” storage memory, the discoveries made in it are returned to the functional memory.

The structure of cultural memory is determined by the tense relationship between functional and cumulative memory, between remembering and forgetting, between the conscious and the unconscious, between the explicit and the latent. Such dynamics make cultural memory a much more complex formation, much more changeable and at the same time more heterogeneous, fragile and controversial than national memory, which is oriented towards unity and ambiguity. The purpose of both national and cultural memory is to transfer experience and knowledge from generation to generation, thereby forming long-term social memory. But both types of memory differ in the very forms of their reproduction. If political memory achieves stabilization due to the extreme density of content, high symbolic intensity, collective rituals and normative obligation, then cultural memory is characterized by the necessary diversity of embodiment in texts, visual images, and three-dimensional artifacts. Both types of memory are based on symbolic means, which provide either “durability” through technologies of preservation such as writing and imagery, or “repeatability” through performative technologies that enable renewal such as ritual, participation, and assimilation. Political memory gives preference to collective forms of assimilation, while for cultural memory individual ways of accessing it play a central role.

The contents of cultural memory - localized in the form of libraries, collections, sculptures or architectural structures and temporalized in the form of festivals, customs and rituals - need constant interpretation, discussion and updating throughout history, since these contents are absorbed by subsequent generations and must correspond to current needs and challenges modernity. Political memory tends towards unification and instrumentalization, but cultural memory, due to its medial and material properties, resists such a narrowing. The contents of cultural memory cannot be subjected to radical unification. This is not possible with the device of accumulative memory itself, which absorbs precisely that which has lost its actual connections and thereby reveals a historical dimension within itself. The same can be said about functional memory, whose components are fundamentally open to many different interpretations and must be conceptualized anew, drawing on many different individual positions and diversity of experience.

From the book Philosophical Dictionary of Mind, Matter, Morality [fragments] by Russell Bertrand

68. Memory True memory, which we must now try to understand, consists in knowledge of past events, but not in all such knowledge. Much of the knowledge of past events, such as what we learn by reading history, is in the same position as

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From the book Consumer Society by Baudrillard Jean

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From the book On the Fourfold Root of the Law of Sufficient Reason author Schopenhauer Arthur

“FUNCTIONAL” TRANSCENDENCE So, the degree of perfection of a particular machine is constantly presented as directly proportional to the degree of its automation. But to automate a machine, you have to give up many of its operational capabilities. To

From the book Simple Good Life author Kozlov Nikolay Ivanovich

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“I-memory” and “me-memory” (Günter Grass) “I remember...” - with these words Günter Grass began his speech on October 1, 2000 in Vilnius at the “Lithuanian-German dialogue on the future of memory”169. We returned to Baroque Vilnius to participate in the dialogue at the invitation of the Goethe Institute

- Every time you can’t remember a name or the name of a place, make a note in your diary.
- What if I can’t remember about the diary?..

In this article, we will introduce you to the principles of memory, talk about techniques for memorizing and retrieving memories, share exercises, recommendations from scientists, and unexpected facts about memory. You will definitely remember this :)

How memory works

Did you know that the very word “memory” misleads us? It makes it seem like we're talking about one thing, one mental skill. But over the past fifty years, scientists have discovered that there are several different memory processes. For example, we have short-term and long-term memory.

Everyone knows that short term memory used when you need to hold a thought in your mind for about a minute (for example, a telephone number you are about to call). At the same time, it is very important not to think about anything else - otherwise you will immediately forget the number. This statement is true for both young and old people, but for the latter its relevance is still slightly higher. Short-term memory is involved in various processes, for example, it is used to track changes in numbers during addition or subtraction.

Long term memory b is responsible for everything that we need in more than a minute, even if during this period you were distracted by something else. Long-term memory is divided into procedural and declarative.

1. Procedural memory concerns activities such as riding a bicycle or playing the piano. Once you have learned to do this, subsequently your body will simply repeat the necessary movements - and this is controlled by procedural memory.
2. Declarative memory, in turn, is involved in the conscious retrieval of information, for example when you need to retrieve a shopping list. This type of memory can be either verbal (verbal) or visual (visual) and is divided into semantic and episodic memory.

• Semantic memory refers to the meaning of concepts (particularly the names of people). Let us assume that knowledge of what a bicycle is belongs to this type of memory.
• Episodic memory- to events. For example, knowing the last time you went on a bike ride appeals to your episodic memory. Part of episodic memory is autobiographical - it concerns various events and life experiences.

Finally we got to prospective memory- it refers to things you are going to do: call a car service, or buy a bouquet of flowers and visit your aunt, or clean the cat's litter box.

How memories are formed and returned

Memory is a mechanism that causes impressions received in the present to influence us in the future. For the brain, new experiences mean spontaneous neural activity. When something happens to us, clusters of neurons come into action, transmitting electrical impulses. Gene work and protein production create new synapses and stimulate the growth of new neurons.

But the process of forgetting is similar to how snow falls on objects, covering them with itself, from which they become white-white - so much so that you can no longer distinguish where everything was.

The impulse that triggers the retrieval of a memory - an internal (thought or feeling) or external event - causes the brain to associate it with an incident from the past. works as a kind of predictive device: it constantly prepares for the future based on the past. Memories condition our perception of the present by providing a “filter” through which we look and automatically assume what will happen next.

The mechanism for retrieving memories has an important property. It has only been thoroughly studied in the last twenty-five years: when we retrieve an encoded memory from internal storage, it is not necessarily recognized as something from the past.

Let's take cycling for example. You get on a bike and just ride, and clusters of neurons fire in your brain that allow you to pedal, balance, and brake. This is one type of memory: an event in the past (trying to learn to ride a bike) influenced your behavior in the present (you ride it), but you do not experience today's bike ride as a memory of the first time you managed to do it.

If we ask you to remember the very first time you rode a bike, you will think, scan your memory storage, and, say, you will have an image of your dad or older sister running after you, you will remember the fear and pain of the first fall or the delight of you managed to get to the nearest turn. And you will know for sure that you are remembering something from the past.

The two types of memory processing are closely related in our daily lives. Those that help us pedal are called implicit memories, and the ability to remember the day we learned to ride is called explicit memories.

Master of mosaics

We have short-term working memory, a slate of consciousness, on which we can place a picture at any given moment. And, by the way, it has a limited capacity where the images present in the foreground of consciousness are stored. But there are other types of memory.

In the left hemisphere, the hippocampus generates factual and linguistic knowledge; in the right - organizes the “building blocks” of life history by time and topics. All this work makes the memory “search engine” more efficient. The hippocampus can be compared to a jigsaw puzzle: it connects individual fragments of images and sensations of implicit memories into complete “pictures” of factual and autobiographical memory.

If the hippocampus is suddenly damaged, for example due to a stroke, memory will also be impaired. Daniel Siegel told this story in his book: “Once at a dinner with friends, I met a man with this problem. He politely told me that he had had several bilateral hippocampal strokes and asked me not to be offended if I went away for a second to get myself some water and he didn’t remember me later. And sure enough, I returned with a glass in my hands, and we introduced ourselves to each other again.”

Like some types of sleeping pills, alcohol is notorious for temporarily shutting down our hippocampus. However, the state of blackout caused by alcohol is not the same as temporary loss of consciousness: the person is conscious (although incapacitated), but does not encode what is happening in explicit form. People experiencing such memory lapses may not remember how they got home or how they met the person with whom they woke up in the same bed in the morning.

The hippocampus also shuts down when angry, and people who suffer from uncontrollable rage are not necessarily lying when they claim not to remember what they said or did in this altered state of consciousness.

How to test your memory

Psychologists use different techniques to test memory. Some of them can be done independently at home.

1. Verbal memory test. Ask someone to read 15 words to you (only unrelated words: “bush, bird, hat”, etc.). Repeat them: people under 45 usually remember about 7-9 words. Then listen to this list four more times. Norm: reproduce 12–15 words. Go about your business and after 15 minutes repeat the words (but only from memory). Most middle-aged people cannot reproduce more than 10 words.
2. Visual memory test. Draw this complex diagram, and after 20 try to draw it from memory. The more details you remember, the better your memory is.

How memory is related to the senses

According to scientist Michael Merzenich, “One of the most important conclusions drawn from the results of the recent study is that the senses (hearing, vision, and others) are closely related to memory and cognitive abilities. Because of this interdependence, the weakness of one often means, or even causes, the weakness of the other.

For example, it is known that patients suffering from Alzheimer's disease gradually lose their memory. And one of the manifestations of this disease is that they begin to eat less. It turned out that since the symptoms of this disease include visual impairment, patients (among other reasons) simply do not see food...

Another example concerns normal age-related changes in cognitive functioning. As a person ages, he becomes more and more forgetful and absent-minded. This is largely explained by the fact that the brain no longer processes sensory signals as well as before. As a result, we lose the ability to retain new visual images of our experiences as clearly as before, and we subsequently have trouble using and retrieving them.”

By the way, it is curious that exposure to blue light enhances the reaction to emotional stimuli of the hypothalamus and amygdala, that is, the areas of the brain responsible for organizing attention and memory. So looking at all shades of blue is helpful.

Techniques and exercises for memory training

The first and most important thing you need to know to have a good memory is. Studies have shown that the hippocampus, responsible for spatial memory, is enlarged in taxi drivers. This means that the more often you engage in activities that use your memory, the better you improve it.

And also here are a few more techniques that will help you develop your memory, improve your ability to recall and remember everything you need.

1. Go crazy!

Katerina Nikitina 12.09.2016

The palaces of the mind
How memory works, what mechanisms help us remember and where our memories are stored

In 1953, a young man, Henry Mollison, who had suffered from epilepsy since early childhood, underwent an operation that changed his life dramatically. During the operation, the surgeon completely removed 27-year-old Mollison's hippocampus, since by that time the epilepsy had reached a fairly severe stage and radical treatment methods were necessary. Observations of Mollison yielded surprising results: the patient remembered everything that happened to him before the removal of the hippocampus, but could not remember anything new.

This case attracted a lot of attention from scientists to the problem of memory and helped take the first step towards global discoveries in neuroscience. The Fleming project worked with scientists to figure out how our memory might actually work.

Memory plays an extremely important role in human life. It is obvious that without memory we would not be able to fully exist in human society. Most likely, we would have died much earlier in the process of evolution: our ancestors would not have been able to remember, teach others and learn themselves what is dangerous in the world around them and how it can be avoided.

From the ancient Greeks to the present day

People have been interested in such a phenomenon as memory since ancient times. Even ancient Greek philosophers tried to answer the questions of where memory is located, what determines its volume and what it is. Parmenides believed that memory is a mixture of heat and cold: if we shake this mixture, forgetting occurs, but if this mixture is at rest, then a person has excellent memory. Diogenes assumed that memory is a uniform distribution of air in the body, and when this distribution changes, either remembering or forgetting occurs. Plato put forward the theory that it is something similar to wax, in which all our impressions and emotions are imprinted. Plato's student, Aristotle, believed that memorization is associated with the movement of blood through the body, and forgetting occurs as a result of a slowdown in its movement. He also formulated the idea of ​​associations as the main mechanism for the emergence of images without visible external stimuli.

Another ancient school, the Roman, was in agreement with Plato and the “wax” theory. A new concept for that time was proposed by the Roman philosopher and physician Galen, who considered memory as a result of the movement of fluids. He suggested that memories are localized in the brain, where they are produced.

Over time, humanity accumulated scientific knowledge and discovered new ways to study memory, and, consequently, new theories emerged. English thinker David HartliveXVIIIcentury, he suggested that there are vibrations in the brain and new impressions change them, after which the vibrations again become the same, but if the impression arises again, then it takes more time to return to the previous state. As a result, this leads to the consolidation of vibrations in a new state - a memory trace is formed. In the twentieth century, this theory found partial confirmation in neurophysiological studies - the effect of reverberation of a nerve impulse in closed circuits of neurons. IN XIX century, French physiologist Pierre Jean Marie Flourens proposed that the brain acts as a single whole, and memory is located in all its parts, and not in one place.

The experimental study of memory was initiated by the German psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus at the end of the 19th century. His work “On Memory” is the first attempt to apply experimental research methods to the study of memory. Ebbinghaus experimented on himself with memorizing and reproducing material, choosing for this purpose meaningless rows of syllables. He conducted experiments for two years. Their main result was the creation of a “forgetting curve,” which shows how long information once memorized is stored in memory.

What is memory

There are many definitions of what memory is. From the point of view of psychology, memory is a trace form of mental reflection of the past, consisting in remembering, preserving and subsequent reproduction or recognition of what was previously perceived. Physiology considers memory as the retention of information about a stimulus after the cessation of its action. If we consider this concept more globally, then memory is one of the properties of the nervous system, which consists in the ability for some time to retain information about events in the external world and the body’s reactions to these events, as well as to reproduce and change this information many times. Memory is inherent in all living organisms that have a sufficiently developed central nervous system. Depending on the degree of development, in different representatives of the animal world, memory manifests itself in different ways: from simple reflexes characteristic of coelenterates to much more complex manifestations of nervous activity characteristic of birds and mammals.

The physiological basis of memory are traces of nervous processes stored in the cortex. Any nervous process, whether excitation or inhibition, leaves its mark in the form of certain functional changes, which, in the event of repeated irritation, facilitate the course of the corresponding nervous processes.

Neurophysiologists call such traces “engrams.” An engram is a memory trace formed as a result of learning. From a scientific point of view, engrams are biochemical and biophysical changes in the brain that appear as a result of external influences; thanks to them we are able to store information. The existence of engrams is one of many modern theories related to memory mechanisms, but this theory has quite a lot of scientific basis and, as a result, adherents among scientists.

Based on the theory of engrams, a hypothesis of memory trace consolidation is constructed. Consolidation is a process leading to the consolidation of an engram, which is realized through reverberation - repeated circulation of an impulse along closed circuits of neurons. The central concepts of this hypothesis are short-term and long-term memory. According to scientists, when information is recorded, a transition occurs from one form of engram to another.

Previously, it was believed that a memory trace goes through two stages in its development: first, the stage of short-term memory, then long-term memory. Thanks to reverberation, the trace is stored in short-term memory for a short period of time (it was assumed that no more than a few minutes). Neurophysiologist Donald Hebb suggested that only certain neurons are involved in the learning process, which, with repeated repetition of the same stimulus, form stable closed “cellular ensembles”, along the chain of which an electrical impulse constantly passes, as a result of which morphofunctional and biochemical changes in synapses occur ( consolidation). With repeated use of the same synaptic contacts, impulse conduction improves and specific proteins are formed.

In the event that the process of reverberation of the impulse is interrupted or prevented, the transition of the engram from short-term memory to long-term memory will be impossible.

This hypothesis finds experimental confirmation. In experiments using methods of experimental retrograde amnesia (when a person forgets what preceded the traumatic event), it was found that in the short-term memory phase the engram is unstable: it can be destroyed, for example, by electric shock. This occurs due to the fact that the reverberation process is interrupted and, as a result, the formation of the engram.

But this hypothesis also has disadvantages.

The main one of these shortcomings is the phenomenon of memory recovery. Despite the effect of electric shock, in some cases the engrams are not destroyed, but the phenomenon of spontaneous memory recovery appears. A person's memory begins to recover.

Scientists have been able to develop methods that can help restore a memory trace after an area of ​​the brain is exposed to an electric shock. They are based on the impact on the brain of electrical impulses of varying strengths before and after experimental retrograde amnesia. These experiments proved that there is another form of existence of engrams, a third, which cannot be reproduced for some time after exposure to the amnestic agent. Thus, scientists came to the conclusion that engrams are not erased, but only their temporary suppression is manifested.

Why are scientists so interested in engrams? There are many information carriers - paper, electronic - and all of them are analogues of engrams. However, our brain is much more complex and much less studied than any of the currently existing processors. We are capable of not only storing information, but also being able to reproduce the necessary memory at the right moment. Thus, by studying the processes of information encoding, scientists hope to get closer to understanding how our memory works.

The theory that separate areas of the brain can store memories first emerged as a result of an experiment in which different parts of the brain were stimulated with electrical discharges to a patient with epilepsy. When the temporal lobe was stimulated, the patient began to experience vivid memories. When this area was repeatedly stimulated, the memory was repeated, which led the researchers to think about searching for similar areas of the cortex with memories.

When external stimuli are perceived, a complex interaction of many nerve cells occurs in different parts of the cerebral cortex, and connections are established between them. Thanks to these temporary connections, the memory process is possible.

Moreover, not only sounds, visual images, smells and tactile sensations (that is, stimuli of the first signaling system) can cause the described nervous processes. Words, irritants of the second signaling system, are also capable of provoking the formation of connections between neurons. However, in both cases, the established temporary neural connections do not remain unchanged. In the process of life, they change, enter into new connections, and are rebuilt under the influence of experience.

Memory includes three separate, but closely related processes: information encoding, storage and reproduction. Encoding of information is necessary for the formation of the already mentioned “memory traces”.

There is a division of memory into sensory, short-term and long-term. Sensory memory provides a brief retention of a stimulus so that we have time to capture it and realize it. Short-term memory (ST) is a storehouse with limited capacity that can be assessed using number memory tasks. Most people can retain about 5-9 elements in memory, and combining them allows you to remember even more. Without repetition, such information will be erased from memory in a few minutes. Long-term memory (LT) is more durable - undoubtedly a much larger storehouse, containing all our knowledge of the world and memories of the past. However, it is more difficult to reproduce memories from long-term memory: the same signal is required as the one at which the information was encoded in LTP.

Where is the memory stored?

No one can still give an exact answer to this question. It is believed that almost all brain structures are involved in memory processes, but scientists identify several areas of the brain that are particularly important in relation to memory.

Various brain structures take part in the process of memorization, which can be divided into a general cerebral level (it includes the reticular formation, hypothalamus, thalamus, hippocampus and frontal cortex) and a regional level (all parts of the cortex except the frontal cortex).

There are many systems, each of which is responsible for its own type of memory. It is known that the temporal cortex is responsible for remembering and storing figurative information, because it is located next to the visual center. The hippocampus plays a major role. The hippocampus is a paired structure located in the center of the temporal hemispheres. The right and left hippocampi are connected by nerve fibers. The hippocampus belongs to one of the oldest systems of the brain - the limbic system, which determines its versatility. Most researchers agree that the hippocampus is involved in memory, but its mechanism is not yet clear.

There is a theory of "two-state memory" that the hippocampus holds information while awake and transfers it to the cerebral cortex during sleep. Another function of the hippocampus is remembering and encoding the surrounding space (spatial memory). In 2014, a group of scientists received the Nobel Prize for the discovery of cells responsible for spatial orientation in the hippocampus of rats. They are activated whenever it is necessary to keep external reference points that determine behavior in focus.

When the hippocampus is damaged, Korsakoff's syndrome occurs - a disease in which the patient, with relatively intact traces of long-term memory, loses memory for current events. Reduced hippocampal volume is one of the early diagnostic signs of Alzheimer's disease.

The hippocampus serves as a meeting place for conditioned and unconditioned stimuli and is involved in consolidation processes. It determines what needs to be remembered at the moment and what is unimportant - this was proven in an experiment in which, when the hippocampus was removed, the patient lost the ability to remember. Despite his inability to perceive new information, Henry Mollison managed to learn to play musical instruments and some computer games, which is attributed to motor memory, since each time Mollison had to re-figure out how to play the game given to him. He was acquiring new motor skills, but did not remember how he acquired them. The man who allowed scientists to make discoveries in the field of neuroscience, and in particular to study the role of the hippocampus, died in 2008 at the age of 82, although he himself believed that he was still 27.

In addition to consolidation, the hippocampus is responsible for reproducing information under the influence of certain stimuli and promotes the formation of new connections between neurons.

There are also genetic memory structures in the brain, localized in the thalamohypothalamic complex. Here are the centers of instincts - food, defensive, sexual, centers of pleasure and aggression, centers of emotions (fear, melancholy, joy, anger and pleasure). Postures, facial expressions, defensive and aggressive movements are recorded in the motor zone.

The limbic system is the zone of human subconscious-subjective experience. Emotional attitudes, stable assessments, and habits are stored here. Long-term behavioral memory is localized in the limbic system.

The neocortex (new cortex) stores everything related to conscious-voluntary activity. The frontal lobes of the brain are the area of ​​verbal-logical memory, where sensory information is transformed into semantic information.

The parietal lobes are responsible for remembering simple tasks. The temporal lobes store long-term memories. The amygdala recalls memories of emotional events.

Memory at the cellular level

The main memory cell is the neuron. Until recently, scientists believed that the processes of nerve cells play a leading role in memory mechanisms, but now the main part of the cell in memory processes is considered to be its body.

Over the past few decades, scientists have been using mollusks to study memory mechanisms.

Why did mollusks become the object of research? Some nerve cells in mollusks are very large, millimeter in size, that is, they are visible to the naked eye. This simplifies experiments and opens up great opportunities for researchers. At the same time, for creatures with such a primitive nervous system, mollusks have rather complex behavior.

Thanks to the squid, John Eccles received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1963 for his discoveries concerning ionic mechanisms of excitation and inhibition in the peripheral and central regions of nerve cells. By studying the activity of the cerebellum, which controls the coordination of muscle movements, Eccles came to the conclusion that inhibition plays a particularly important role in the cerebellum. In 2000, the Aplysia snail helped Eric Kendal win a prize for his discovery that short-term memory is caused by the phosphorylation of proteins that form channels in cell membranes through which calcium ions and other ions involved in the transmission of nerve impulses can pass. And long-term memory is ensured by the synthesis of new proteins, triggered by exposure to strong stimuli. These proteins change the structure of the synapse and its sensitivity to subsequent stimuli. After successful experiments on snails, Kendal decided to test his theory on mice and found exactly the same mechanism as in aplasia.

It wasn't just Kendal who used Aplysia for his research. UCLA scientists have questioned the widely held belief that long-term memory is stored at synapses in the brain. To confirm their guesses, they conducted a series of experiments on the famous snails.

Previously, it was believed that memory processes are caused by synaptic communication between neurons with the help of a special substance - serotonin, one of the most important neurotransmitters, also called the “happiness hormone”. Serotonin performs many important functions, but participation in memory mechanisms, according to the latest research, was not included in their list.

Researchers exposed Aplysia to electric current, thus inducing in them a flexion reflex, which is precisely a manifestation of long-term memory. The electrical shock caused the release of serotonin, which in turn formed synaptic connections that generated and stored memories.

If the release of serotonin was disrupted at the first stage of the experiment, memory impairment also occurred.

The next stage of the experiment was carried out using a Petri dish, where Aplysia nerve cells were placed. When serotonin was added, new synaptic connections were formed and memory was preserved. If, immediately after serotonin, an inhibitor was added to the cup, which interfered with the release of proteins, then synaptic connections were not formed and memory was impaired. If the inhibitor was introduced after twenty-four hours, then synaptic connections continued to develop, and memory was not impaired.

Scientists continued to experiment with serotonin and found that if two portions of serotonin were added to neurons in a petri dish at an interval of 24 hours, and immediately after that a protein inhibitor was introduced, then synaptic connections and memories were erased. When counting the remaining synaptic connections, it turned out that their number returned to the level that existed before the start of the experiment. It turned out that among both the disappeared and the surviving connections there were both new and old ones. Why this happens and what determines the safety of connections, no one currently knows.

When conducting the same experiment with a living mollusk, it turned out that although some of the synaptic connections disappeared, the very memory of the electric shock in the mollusk was preserved. Hence the most important conclusion was drawn: memories are not stored in synapses at all, but in some other parts of the nervous system. Scientists cannot yet determine exactly where, but there is an assumption that the nuclei of neurons are responsible for long-term memory. This gives great hope to people with Alzheimer's and their loved ones: if memories are stored not in synapses, but in neurons, then as long as the nerve cells are alive, memories can be revived.

Another interesting phenomenon in the world of neurophysiology is the “granny neuron”. The term was first used by neuroscientist Jerry Letwin in 1969 during a conversation with students. He said: “If the human brain is made up of specialized neurons, and they encode the unique properties of different objects, then, in principle, somewhere in the brain there must be a neuron with which we recognize and remember our grandmother.” This term has taken root in science, but there are other options for the name of this neuron - “Monroe neuron”, “Halle Berry neuron”, “Eiffel Tower neuron”, etc.

The “granny neuron” theory was bolstered by a 2005 study in which neuroscientist Christoph Koch of the California Institute of Technology and neurosurgery professor Itzhak Fried of the University of California at Los Angeles found that celebrity recognition is controlled by individual cells in the brain.

The neurons were activated not only when exposed to the corresponding visual stimulus, but also when the names of objects were spoken out loud and if the subject himself thought about them. Despite the fact that the discovery of “grandmother neurons” did not greatly help in understanding the mechanisms of recognition, their discovery paved the way for new experiments, the results of which may allow scientists to answer the question “how does our memory work?”

Neuroscience is a vast interconnected network of disciplines that includes not only sciences such as physiology and biochemistry, but also computer science, engineering, linguistics, medicine, physics, philosophy and psychology. Having developed from neurobiology, this scientific field is currently one of the most advanced and exciting. Thanks to scientists who have studied and are studying the neurons of mollusks, influencing the brain with electrical impulses, and also performing many other complex operations on the brains of experimental animals, in the near future there will be a lot of discoveries that will allow us to take a fresh look at our nervous system, to understand how our memory works, and maybe find out what other possibilities our brain hides.

Nowadays, a considerable amount of scientific knowledge has been accumulated, but there is still no single picture about the processes of memorization. Perhaps, as a result of further developments in science, scientists will be able to invent a way in which we will be able to understand this complex process.

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