How and when those processes operate can depend on various factors, such as physical activity, stress and sleep.
But sleep may also aid memory by suppressing the processes that drive forgetting, Davis and Zhong point out. A study published in Cell found evidence that sleep inhibits release of the dopamine forgetting signal to mushroom body neurons. If forgetting is the key to how the brain successfully processes the massive data input it encounters each day — as research accumulated so far suggests — then flaws in the forgetting process could plausibly contribute to brain disorders, Davis and Zhong note.
Deficits in the ability to forget may be involved in autism spectrum disorders, for instance. Certainly the powerful and debilitating memories of post-traumatic stress disorder reflect an inability to forget disturbing experiences. Unwanted, repetitive invasive memories are a feature of some psychiatric disorders, such as schizophrenia.
And the inability to forget cues associated with addictive drug use impairs recovery from substance abuse. On the plus side, better insight into the biology of forgetting could help identify drugs capable of enhancing needed memories while disposing of undesirable ones. But such benefits may appear only after much more research, Davis said at the neuroscience meeting — speaking at a rather sparsely attended session.
But he expects that the field will rapidly attract more attention. Tom Siegfried is a science writer and editor in the Washington, DC, area.
He writes the Context blog for Science News and is at work on a book about the history of the multiverse. This article originally appeared in Knowable Magazine , an independent journalistic endeavor from Annual Reviews. Sign up for the newsletter. Register or Log In. The Magazine Shop.
Login Register Stay Curious Subscribe. The mind may purge memories in an effort to be more efficient. Newsletter Sign up for our email newsletter for the latest science news. Sign Up. Already a subscriber? Want more? More From Discover. Recommendations From Our Store. One problem with this theory, however, is that research has demonstrated that even memories which have not been rehearsed or remembered are remarkably stable in long-term memory.
Research also suggests that the brain actively prunes memories that become unused, a process that is known as active forgetting. As memories accumulate, those that are not retrieved eventually become lost.
Sometimes people forget due to a phenomenon known as interference. Some memories compete and interfere with other memories. When information is very similar to other information that was previously stored in memory, interference is more likely to occur.
There are two basic types of interference:. Sometimes the act of remembering something can lead to other things being forgotten. Research suggests that retrieving some information from memory can lead to retrieval-induced forgetting.
This is particularly common when memory retrieval cues are very similar. While this causes forgetting, research also suggests that this type of forgetting can actually be adaptive. By forgetting one memory in favor of another, it reduces the chance of interference happening again in the future. While interference can make it difficult to remember some things, there are things you can do to minimize its effects.
Rehearsing new information is often the most effective approach. By essentially overlearning new things, it is less likely that old information will compete with new. Sometimes, losing information has less to do with forgetting and more to do with the fact that it never made it into long-term memory in the first place. Encoding failures sometimes prevent information from entering long-term memory. In one classic experiment, researchers asked participants to identify the correct U.
While people are familiar with this everyday object, they were surprisingly bad at being able to detect key details. The reason for this is that only details necessary for distinguishing pennies from other coins were encoded into your long-term memory. Identifying a penny does not require knowing the exact image or words found on the coin.
Because this information is not really needed, most people never memorize it and commit it to memory. Memories also tend to get simplified. While you might remember the overall gist of something, you are likely to forget many of the details.
This is actually an adaptive function that allows you to efficiently store important things that you need to remember in the future. Sometimes we may actively work to forget memories, especially those of traumatic or disturbing events or experiences.
Painful memories can be upsetting and anxiety-provoking, so there are times we may desire to eliminate them. The two basic forms of motivated forgetting are suppression, which is a conscious form of forgetting, and repression, an unconscious form of forgetting. However, the concept of repressed memories is not universally accepted by all psychologists.
One of the problems with repressed memories is that it is difficult, if not impossible, to scientifically study whether or not a memory has been repressed.
Also note that mental activities such as rehearsal and remembering are important ways of strengthening memory, and memories of painful or traumatic life events are far less likely to be remembered, discussed, or rehearsed. Forgetting painful memories and traumas may help people cope better. While these events might not be entirely forgotten, forgetting the vivid details can help blunt the difficult emotions that are attached to those memories and make them easier to live with. There are also a number of other factors that can play a role in why people forget.
Other common causes of forgetfulness include:. If you are concerned about your forgetting or if it is accompanied by other symptoms, talk to your doctor. Early intervention may help improve outcomes for some memory problems and conditions, so it is important to seek help right away. While some forgetting is inevitable, there are some things you can do to help cement important information in your memory.
Some practices that may help reduce forgetfulness include:. While forgetting is often viewed negatively, it can actually help improve memory. Being able to let go of irrelevant memories and only hold on to the important information helps keep those saved memories stronger, a phenomenon known as adaptive forgetting. While forgetting is not something that you can avoid, understanding the reasons for it can be useful. Understanding the cognitive psychology that underlies that ability, as well as the mental resilience that is necessary for developing it, could help to improve treatment for PTSD.
If forgetting is truly a well-regulated, innate part of the memory process, he says, it makes sense that dysregulation of that process could have negative effects. More from Nature Outlooks. That question is yet to be answered. But more memory researchers are shifting their focus to examine how the brain forgets, as well as how it remembers. In the past decade, researchers have begun to view forgetting as an important part of a whole. Memory, first and foremost, is there to serve an adaptive purpose.
It endows us with knowledge about the world, and then updates that knowledge. This article is part of Nature Outlook: The brain , an editorially independent supplement produced with the financial support of third parties.
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