Brain Hack: Optimize Your Working Memory
All aspects of your memory (long term, short term, and working) are important, but when it comes to everyday life, it is working memory that is the hero.
What is working memory?
Working memory is like a mental whiteboard (or mental chalkboard), providing short-term storage of information required for thinking (cognition), decision making, problem-solving, reasoning, manipulation, examination, and speech.
Suppose you struggle to keep information in your mind; you may not have a strong working memory. A neurologist or psychologist can test for working memory if you’re worried.
Working memory is amazing; however, it needs to be kept up to date and current, and it has a limited capacity, so it has a purposeful design: everything written on it is temporary, like it’s written in disappearing magic ink. The length of time an item stays available depends on a few things:
1. Salience (how important your mind perceives it to be)
2. Emotion charge (the more emotionally charged, the longer it stays)
3. Attention (if you consciously focus on it)
4. Other competing items.
5. Distractions
Examples of working memory in everyday life
• You’re in a conversation, and you hold a thought until it’s your turn to speak
• You can calculate a gratuity in your head
• You remember where you have put your keys or phone
• You remember directions
• You can process information in your head
• You plan to do something and can think of all the resources you need
• You retain information that you have just read.
Working memory’s capacity reaches it’s peak around 25 and then declines gradually with age and more rapidly if your brain is not working well, for example, if you are stressed, tired or sick.
Helping out your working memory
Some people have a remarkable working memory, but these people are rare. For most of us, our working memory needs a little help; we can do this with “elaboration,” increasing the areas of the brain involved by bringing more attention to the item. Saying things out loud helps items stay in working memory. Chunk complex information into smaller pieces (e.g., chunk phone numbers into groups of 3 or 4 numbers). Writing things down creates a visual hard copy of the items in your working memory. It helps bring more attention to the item, increases salience, and reduces decreases distractibility, allowing you to think, make decisions and solve problems plus, the items written down do not vanish. There is no shame in writing things down; you are just helping out your working memory.
Improving working memory
Meditation. in her book Peak Mind Amishi Jha reveals that her research found that meditation practice was a powerful way to improve working memory. She also recommends avoiding multitasking which is actually attention shifting and is very bad for working memory.
Brain games or brain training activities like crosswords, Sudoku, and digital brain training games (such as CogMed) can help improve working memory.
Learning a new language can help improve working memory, and there are some great apps that reward you when you successfully remember something you just learned, giving a dopamine reward for your efforts.
Create habits so that your working memory can be saved for more important things. For example, always put your keys in the same place.
Optimize brain health (and body health). A healthy brain works better, including working memory. To improve brain health, make sure you:
• eat a healthy balanced diet (avoid highly processed foods),
• exercise regularly and avoid long periods of inactivity,
• get seven-plus hours of quality sleep,
• drink lots of water,
• avoid brain toxins: smoking, alcohol, mind-altering drugs (unless prescribed),
• take supplements if needed (most people benefit from vitamin D, fish oil, and probiotics at least),
• avoid head trauma: your brain is vulnerable to injury so protect it from trauma. For example wear a helmet if you’re cycling,
• see your doctor if you have a medical issue or are worried about your memory. Anxiety, depression, chronic stress and ADHD, autism, learning disabilities, PTSD, and dementia.
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