According to recent research, it seems that more and more Britons have come to rely on Blackberrys, Ipods and mobile phones to store information. Many people have come to rely on them as a “memory substitute”. Unfortunately the downside to this is that all this reliance on modern technology is making us forgetful. A recent survey found that only one in three people in the under 30’s age group could remember the phone nos. of friends before they had to look them up. In addition a worrying 5% couldn’t remember their own home address! Unfortunately when people use all this technology, they are not using their own memories. It’s obviously true what the experts tell us, the less you use your memory, the poorer it becomes. You have been warned!
7 comments:
It probably started even before the electronic gizmos as I always had a handwritten diary/filofax doing eaxcly the same thing as there is no way in modern business we could manage without those things. When I retired I was amazed at the thousands of details I had written down when I needed to sort out the business details from personal ones.
I can still remember the telephone number from my first residence. Yet, I have trouble remembering the number I have now.
I don't have any Blackberrys or Ipods to act as a memory substitute...so I have no excuse. There is probably something to be said for memorizing poems, etc. as an exercise for the brain.
Good point Jackie. I suppose writing things down is as bad as using modern gizmos as it's still a memory substitute.
I agree Marion memorizing poems, etc, is good exercise for the brain. I think crosswords are good too.
You have a point though, Naomi. We tend to reach for our address books to get a much used phone number instead of tapping it out from memory.
I must admit I do that a lot Janey. It would be better to try and memorise friends' phone numbers.
It's not that anyone is actually getting more forgetful, it's just that we don't bother to learn phone numbers like we used to. Email addresses are a different matter though, I bet you can remember more email addresses than phone numbers, so in one sense you could claim our memories are better. But, of course, neither is true, our memories are the same as they've always been, what's changed is what we choose to fill them with.
Yes I suppose that's true David. Also there is so much more to remember nowadays than in years gone by - pin numbers for example as we now live in a credit and debit card age!
Post a Comment