“As gravity holds matter from flying off into space, so memory
gives stability to knowledge; it is the cohesion which keeps
things from falling into a lump, or flowing in waves.” -Emerson
There’s a fascinating – and, to me, disquieting – study on the
internet’s effects on memory that’s just come out in Science.*
It provides more evidence of how quickly and flexibly our minds
adapt to the tools we use to think with, for better or for
worse. The study, “Google Effects on Memory: Cognitive
Consequences of Having Information at Our Fingertips,” was
conducted by three psychologists: Betsy Sparrow, of Columbia
University; Jenny Liu, of the University of Wisconsin at
Madison; and Daniel Wegner, of Harvard. They conducted a series
of four experiments aimed at answering this question: Does our
awareness of our ability to use Google to quickly find any fact
or other bit of information influence the way our brains form
memories? The answer, they discovered, is yes: “when people
expect to have future access to informatio