Technology has changed not only how we access information, but how much of it we expect ourselves to remember.
With so much of our everyday lives stored on devices, remembering something can increasingly mean knowing where to find it rather than holding onto the information itself.
The phenomenon is often called “digital amnesia”. However, psychologists more commonly discuss the behaviour through concepts such as cognitive offloading and transactive memory rather than treating digital amnesia as a clinical condition.
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Cognitive offloading refers to using external tools to reduce the mental demands of a task. People have long done this through diaries, notebooks and maps. Smartphones have simply brought many of those systems together in one device.
Speaking to Khaleej Times, Asra Sarwar, Clinical Psychologist at Aster Clinic, Discovery Gardens and Bur Dubai, explained what happens when information remains available at the tap of a screen.
“We can become less likely to encode information mentally when we know it is reliably stored elsewhere,” Sarwar said. “In that sense, we may remember where to find the information rather than the information itself.”
Birthdays offer a familiar example. Remembering a close friend’s birthday once meant knowing the date or thinking about it before the day arrived. Today, a social media notification can take care of the remembering.
“We outsource prospective memory to calendars and reminders, navigation to GPS, calculations to calculators, information retrieval to search engines, and increasingly planning and problem solving to AI,” Sarwar said.
Even spelling can be outsourced. Autocorrect and predictive text can intervene before we have to work out whether we have written a word correctly.
“They may reduce how often we actively retrieve spelling or vocabulary, particularly if we automatically accept suggestions,” Sarwar said. However, she added that there is insufficient evidence to say normal use causes a general decline in language ability.
The same caution applies to memory.
“It can change which cognitive skills we practise, but there is not sufficient evidence to conclude that technology causes a general decline in memory or cognition,” Sarwar said.
Instead, she said the brain adapts to what we regularly practise, meaning particular skills can become less efficient when they are used less often, while other abilities strengthen.
But the bigger issue may be attention.
“Attention is fundamental to memory formation, so frequent interruptions and switching between tasks can interfere with how deeply information is processed and encoded,” Sarwar said. “In practice, the concern may be less about the device itself and more about fragmented attention.”
Research suggests even having a smartphone nearby may compete for some of that mental capacity. A 2017 study published in the Journal of the Association for Consumer Research found that participants had less available cognitive capacity when their smartphones were nearby, even when they were not actively using them. The effect was greater among those who reported higher smartphone dependence.
Dr Rita Figueiredo, clinical psychologist and Managing Director of Peninsula Psychology in Dubai, echoed a similar view.
“If the brain learns that a piece of information will always be available within a few seconds, there is less reason to store it in detail,” Figueiredo said.
GPS shows how this can extend beyond facts and dates.
“If I always use GPS, for example, I may become less confident in my sense of direction because I am no longer paying attention to landmarks, distances, and the relationship between different places,” Figueiredo said.
Technology can also remove some of the mental effort involved in learning.
“We can complete a task successfully with technological assistance and retain very little of what we have done,” Figueiredo said.
Figueiredo is cautious about assuming younger generations are simply becoming worse at remembering. While they may have less reason to memorise information that can be searched instantly, she said they may also become highly skilled at finding, comparing and navigating large amounts of information.
Neither psychologist suggests abandoning technology.
“Humans have always used tools and external systems to extend what we can do,” Sarwar said. “The key is to use technology to extend our abilities rather than replace our ability to function without it.”
Figueiredo similarly sees cognitive offloading as useful. A shopping list can save someone from mentally repeating the same items all afternoon, while a calendar can free them from keeping every appointment in their head.
“The interesting question is what we do with the mental space it gives us,” Figueiredo said.
That space could allow us to think more deeply, solve complicated problems or be more present with other people. But if it is immediately filled by another notification, video or stream of information, Figueiredo said people can instead end up feeling “more mentally crowded”.
Overreliance becomes more apparent when convenience limits what someone feels able to do without a device, such as immediately searching for an answer without trying to recall it or using GPS for a familiar route.
“Healthy technology use should preserve flexibility rather than create dependence,” Sarwar said.
Keeping those abilities active does not require switching off completely. Sarwar recommends occasionally remembering names and numbers, navigating without GPS, doing mental calculations and reading with focused attention.
Technology can give us somewhere else to store details we no longer need to carry around in our heads. The bigger question may be what we choose to do with the mental space it leaves behind.
Source: Khaleej Times