remembering how to use the keys to someone else’s front door if
you have only been shown once. Or, when you see someone whose
face you definitely know but cannot immediately place, you have to
work out where you last saw them and find some way of triggering
your memory of their name.Instant, short term, or long term?
The fact that you do not remember everything you experience is
part of your brain’s survival mechanism. You mostly remember
what you need to, what is important to you for some reason. In a
typical day there are many items that are only ever going to be part
of your instant memories lasting a few seconds only—for example,
what cereal you have eaten, the color of the pen you have just
picked up, or the number plate of the car in front of you. Then
there are short-term memories—what you need to take to work,
who is picking up your children, where you are going.
Luckily for you, much of the trivia of life—who said what to
whom—is almost instantly forgotten. But, the important things
need to be kept for the longer term. You learn and remember how
to cross a road safely, for example, by learning and recalling the
noise and sights that indicate the presence of cars. You store mem-
ories of what a particular gesture or tone of voice conveys and con-
sequently know when someone is getting angry or upset.
Some of your instant, short-term, and long-term memories
are implicit, some are explicit.Is memory about items of information or processes?
Your memory clearly has to deal with individual items: the image of
your own house, a particular face, a word, or a symbol. But it also
has to store memories of important processes, like some of the
examples we have already suggested: driving a car, kicking a ball, or
putting a key in a lock.120 Power Up Your Mind