What does a ten-dollar bill look like (or a common banknote, if you're not American)? Do you think you'd be able to draw one? Although we see coins and banknotes on a regular basis and therefore have virtually limitless opportunities to learn their shape, few people could sketch one accurately. Looking at something repetitively does not guarantee that we will remember it later. Why can't we draw a ten-dollar bill, yet we could recognize it instantly if we saw one?
10美元長什么樣子?(或者如果你不是美國人,常見的鈔票長什么樣?)你覺得自己能畫出來嗎?盡管我們經(jīng)??吹接矌藕外n票,因此的的確確有無數(shù)機會了解他們的樣子,但很少有人能夠準(zhǔn)確地勾勒出來。反復(fù)看一個東西,并不保證我們?nèi)蘸竽苡浧鹚?。為什么我們沒法畫出10美元的樣子,可是一旦看見立刻就能認(rèn)出它呢?
To unravel this mystery, we need to break the act of remembering things into its atomic parts. Those parts are:
要解開這個謎團,我們需要把記住東西這件事分解為更基本的部分,分別是:
1.Encoding—the process of putting the information into your brain.
編碼——把信息輸入大腦的過程
2.Storage—the process of keeping the information in your brain.
存儲——在大腦中保存信息的過程
3.Retrieval—the process of getting the information out of your brain when you need it.
檢索——在需要的時候從大腦中取得信息的過程
Understanding these three functions is essential if you want to have a better memory. Any attempt to improve your memory must either encode the information better (or in a format you're more likely to retrieve), store the information better and longer, or retrieve it in the situation you need.
如果想要擁有更好的記憶力,那么理解這三個功能至關(guān)重要。任何嘗試提高記憶力的做法,要么更好地編碼信息(或者以一種更容易檢索的形式編碼),更好、更持久地存儲信息,要么更好地在需要的情況下檢索信息。
Let's look at all three and see how we might be able to improve our memories.
讓我們來分析一下這三個部分,然后看看可以如何提高我們的記憶力。
——節(jié)選自《記憶的科學(xué)》