How Memory Works

How Memory Works, written by Russ Bouillac. Focus question, how does something become a short -term or a long -term memory?

《记忆如何工作》，作者：拉斯·布亚克。 核心问题：信息是如何变成短期记忆或长期记忆的？

A quick experiment. Let's do an experiment. Pay attention to what's going on around you for just a moment. What can you see, touch, taste, smell, and hear? After you paid attention to your senses, did you notice anything different? You probably did. That's because our brains are always receiving information from our senses. There is so much information, though, that we can't possibly pay attention to all of it. Indeed, we only remember a very small amount of the information around us. How does memory work? Scientists have some ideas, but many more questions remain.

一个小实验 我们来做个实验吧 花一小会儿，留意你身边正在发生的事 你能看到、摸到、尝到、闻到、听到什么呢？ 当你开始关注自己的感官后，有没有发现什么不一样？ 你多半发现了哦 这是因为我们的大脑一直在通过感官接收信息 不过信息实在太多了，我们根本不可能全都注意到 没错，我们只能记住身边信息里很小的一部分 记忆到底是怎么工作的呢？ 科学家们有一些猜想，但还有很多问题尚未解开

Types of Memory Scientists often talk about two types of memory, working memory and long -term memory. Working memory is how we deal with information in the moment. The words you're reading right now and the conversation you just had with a friend are part of your working memory. So is the music you were listening to on the way to school. We use our working memory most of the time.

记忆的分类 科学家通常把记忆分成两类：工作记忆和长期记忆 工作记忆是我们处理当下信息时用到的记忆 你现在正在读的文字、你刚和朋友聊过的天，都属于你的工作记忆 你上学路上听的音乐，也同样属于工作记忆 我们大部分时候都在使用工作记忆

Short -term memories make up our working memory, which also includes something called executive attention. This is the process of how our brains filter information into short -term memory. Think about the experiment at the beginning of this book. Even when we're sitting quietly, our brains can't handle all the information we receive. Our brains ignore most of the information around us to keep from overloading. The information we do keep in our minds at any one time makes up our short -term memory. Most of us can only hold around three to four thoughts in our short -term memory at once.

短期记忆构成了工作记忆，工作记忆里还包含一种叫做执行注意力的功能 这就是大脑把信息筛选进短期记忆的过程 想想这本书开头我们做的那个实验吧 就算我们安静坐着，大脑也处理不了接收到的所有信息 大脑会忽略身边大部分信息，避免自己超负荷运转 我们某一刻留在脑子里的信息，就构成了短期记忆 大多数人一次只能在短期记忆里容纳三到四个想法

For example, you might be listening to your teacher and scratching an itch on your arm at the same time. You might think about a few other ideas. Then someone sneezes loudly. What happens? Your attention turns to the person who sneezed. Information only stays in our short -term memory for a few seconds. Once our executive attention gets to work and we start paying attention to something, things change. Our executive attention makes sure that unimportant information doesn't interrupt the things that we are concentrating on. It also makes sure we pay attention to other important things, such as a sneeze. Your brain may think any loud, sudden noise means danger. If we don't give information attention,

举个例子：你可能一边听老师讲课，一边挠胳膊上发痒的地方 你脑子里可能还在想另外几件事 这时有人大声打了个喷嚏 会发生什么呢？ 你的注意力会转到打喷嚏的人身上 信息在短期记忆里只能停留几秒钟 当我们的执行注意力启动，开始关注某件事时，情况就变了 执行注意力会保证不重要的信息不会打扰我们正在专注的事 它也会让我们关注其他重要的事，比如那一声喷嚏 大脑会认为任何响亮、突然的声响都可能代表危险 如果我们根本不关注某个信息，

Long -term memories function differently from working memories. They remain in our minds even when we're not thinking about them. Scientists think information has to go through three steps to become a long -term memory. First, we learn something. Then, we store it. Later, we retrieve it. We can bring back long -term memories when needed. For example, think about your birthday. The date probably came to mind before you even finished reading the sentence. Maybe other memories, such as your birthday parties, also came to mind. You might have even thought about your family. That's because our brains connect different pieces of related information.

长期记忆的工作方式和工作记忆不同 就算我们不去想它，它也会一直留在我们的脑子里 科学家认为，信息要变成长期记忆需要经过三个步骤 第一步，我们学到新内容 第二步，我们把它储存起来 第三步，我们把它提取出来 我们需要的时候就能调出长期记忆 举个例子，想想你的生日 你可能还没读完这句话，生日日期就已经浮现在脑海里了 说不定其他回忆，比如你的生日派对，也一起冒出来了 你说不定还想起了你的家人 这是因为大脑会把不同的相关信息连接在一起