Human Memory: What It Is and How to Improve It

You have to begin to lose your memory, if only in bits and pieces, to realise that memory is what makes our lives. Our memory is our coherence, our reason, our feeling, even our action. Without it, we are nothing.
Luis Buñue, spanish fim makerl
Silvia Helena Cardoso, PhD

What makes us remember a detailed story that had occurred in the past? Why don't we ever forget how to drive a car? How do we naturally let flow complicated phrases of long songs?

In these examples, the memory appears as a process of information retention in which our experiences are archived and then recovered when we recall them. Memory is intimately associated with learning, which is our ability to change behavior through experiences that are stored in memory. In other words, learning is the acquisition of new knowledge, and memory is the retention of this learned knowledge.

Thus, learning and memory are the basis of all our knowledge, abilities, and planing, making us consider the past, to place us in the present, and to predict the future.

Types of Memory

Remembering and Forgetting

The Brain Mechanisms of Memory

The Brain's Growth

Loss of Memory

How to Improve Your Memory

Test Your Memory

Interesting links:
Memory Links
Memory: A Contribution to Experimental Psychology
Memory Strategies
Memory and False memories
Mindsport. Photographic memory training
Remembering Made Easier
Recovered Memories of Sexual Abuse: Scientific Research & Scholarly Resources
Memory and Dementia

Silvia Helena Cardoso, PhD, psychobiologist, master and doctor in Sciences by the University of São Paulo and post doctoral fellowship by the University of California, Los Angeles. Associate researcher of the Center for Biomedical Inofrmatics, State University of Campinas (Unicamp), Brazil. Correspondence

Center for Biomedical Informatics
State University of Campinas, Brazil
 

Silvia Helena Cardoso, PhD

Copyright 1997 State University of Campinas