Sometimes we fail to remember something and feel guilty

Guilt and memory failure
Some people regard memory as an open or shut case.
We either remember or don’t remember.
For other people, memory involves three categories: remembering, not remembering, or not being sure whether we remember.
However, we also have feelings about our capability to remember something. Sometimes we fail to remember and laugh about it.
Other times we fail to remember and feel guilty about our failure (or at least we seem to be guilty).
This column considers three issues about guilt when we forget.
We will examine guilt for forgetting someone’s name, forgetting an appointment with someone, and when people fake feeling guilty for forgetting.
Failing to remember someone’s name
Some people believe that a person’s name is the sound he or she most enjoys hearing. This is what Dale Carnegie believed. This seems like a stretch to me. For example, I believe that the most precious sound is “here is the money I owe you.” Seriously, forgetting someone’s name is the memory failure that most adults find most annoying because guilt may be involved.
The failure to recall someone’s name can make this person feel that we do not respect them or care for them.
This is especially true if the name is for someone we are close to. For example, significant others get steamed if we do not recall their name. Worse yet, significant others get more than steamed if we call them by some other name than their own.
However, a few years ago, a friend of mine pointed out that there are much worse memory failures than forgetting names.
Forgetting to do something we promised to do for someone may convey regard as low or lower than forgetting someone’s name.
Worse than forgetting a name, people may forget who someone else is.
Perhaps forgetting a person’s identity conveys very low regard or lack of regard.
But should people get hurt when someone forgets their name? At the moment of forgetting someone’s name, we may be distracted by our worries. Sometimes serious events occur in our lives. When this happens, there is little room left in our consciousness for trying to remember a name.
I propose that when we forget a name at a time our life is collapsing around us, we should not feel guilty. I propose as well that the person who forgets a name should not be made to feel guilty. Alternatively, when someone forgets money they owe us, they should feel guilty.
Forgetting an appointment
Some people believe that the failure to make an appointment is also indicative of disrespect or lack of affection. After all, if someone cannot remember when to show up for an appointment, then it must be the case that this person does not value the appointment as much as other things that he or she could do at the time of the appointment. But is this conclusion really correct?
A person may miss an appointment for some very valid reasons. A legitimate reason that leads a person to miss an appointment is when something comes up at the time he or she was to leave and go to the appointment. Sometimes the reason for missing an appointment is one that everyone would agree was legitimate. There are many events that pre-empt making an appointment: giving birth to a child, an emergency involving a good friend, a chore on which one’s life or comfort depends (such as picking up essential medicine), a fire at home or at work.
Alternatively, some events legitimately pre-empt an appointment but we cannot tell the person whose appointment we missed because the reason for missing it is of a personal and private nature. For example, people may miss an appointment because they were given a speeding ticket, they were just served papers for a lawsuit, or they had been in an argument with their significant other. In any case, when we miss an appointment for good reasons that we may or may not want to talk about, we should not feel guilty.
Falsely professing guilt for memory failure
Now I would not do this and I know neither would you. Nevertheless, not assuming some guilt can on occasion offend another person. When people call someone by the wrong name, it is sometimes seen as insulting. When people make this mistake, they understandably may choose to look a little embarrassed. Also when forgetting an appointment is seen as insulting, people who have clearly forgotten an appointment also may choose to appear guilty. In both of these cases when a show of guilt may be called for, a person also may sincerely feel bad about the memory failure.
Alternatively, a show of guilt for some memory failures is hard to believe. For example, some people claim to feel guilty because they forgot their New Year’s resolutions. Nevertheless, is guilt for such a memory failure credible? For example, we go all year long neglecting something (like our weight) or not doing something we should do (like exercise). Do we truly expect ourselves to turn over a new leaf and start a new life on Jan. 1st? I don’t think so, and I suspect, neither do you.
A change in behavior requires much more than a resolution. A change in behavior requires considerable effort. Perhaps it would be good if we actually did feel guilty when we forget to live up to our New Year’s resolutions. If we actually were burdened by guilt for forgetting our resolutions, we would take steps to eliminate this guilt by making and remembering to keep them. But we know that in most cases, New Year’s resolutions are just fantasies (except for the approximately three of us for whom guilt is helpful).

January 09, 2008 08:52 pm

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A Sharper Mind: Benefiting from each others memory failures

We all are forgetful occasionally and leave something of ours behind in public places such as stores, shopping centers, and at the homes of family, friends and acquaintances. For example, we may forget to take with us things like a pair of gloves, an umbrella, a scarf or a jacket. Because we are all in this world together, we should forgive each other's memory failures.
This column proposes that we establish a kind of universal agreement where we hope that some other soul can make use of what we have lost. Additionally, this agreement also means that we should make good use of things we find when the owner is unknown. We certainly should not throw such things away. This column will, first, examine what kinds of things are lost that we may find and make use of. Second, we will note that Lost and Found Offices sometimes have sales of things that they have held for months or years. Third, we will review the ethics of making use of lost things.
Exchange of Common Things
When you lose a pair of gloves, an umbrella, a scarf or a jacket, don’t fret too much about it. You can be confident that someone else will make use of your forgotten thing. On the other hand, if you have lost any of these things, you can always go and buy a replacement. However, you do not necessarily have to buy a replacement. You can find what you need among the things lost by others.
Need an umbrella? Put an umbrella stand by your door. You will discover after a period of time several umbrellas growing out of your stand; people often forget to take their umbrella with them. If you can’t afford an umbrella stand, visit a college campus after a storm and you will find umbrellas lying about.
Need a pair of gloves, a scarf or a jacket? Put a clothes tree or coat hooks by your front or back door. Sooner or later, someone who visits you will forget and leave a scarf or even a jacket. Again visit a college campus at the beginning of spring, late in the day when the weather has changed from cold to warm. Wander through the student center or the buildings with classrooms. Late in the day these places will be almost empty except for gloves, scarves and jackets left behind. There is a good chance that you will find what you need. College students (and their teachers) have a good memory for their courses (if they want). However, they are very forgetful of their accessories, not to mention their notes and books.
If you have large pot luck parties, some people will forget to take home the food and refreshments they brought. If many people attended, then it is nearly impossible to know who left what food and drinks behind. Wait a few days or even a week; if the owner does not call and ask to pick up what they left, you can assume that you can use what was left.
Lost and Found Offices.
You can find Lost and Found offices in lots of places: colleges, libraries, bus stations, train stations, airports, golf courses, tennis clubs – even shopping centers. Such offices exist because of our forgetful nature. Our inclination to be forgetful is so bad that we often forget where we left something – or even that we left something. If we forget where we left something, we obviously will no longer have it and it may end up in a lost and found.
Some lost and found offices put up conspicuous signs with lists of lost objects to remind owners that these offices hold these objects. However, when some people realize that a lost and found office may have what they lost, they still will not retrieve their lost possessions there because doing so would involve admitting to a memory failure. Because of our fragile memory ability – or pride about not admitting to a memory failure, Lost and Found offices overflow with lost belongings.
When objects remain in a lost and found office unclaimed for weeks, months or years, the managers of the office conclude that no one will ever come for these things. To find space for newly lost items, some lost and offices will periodically throw away things that have been there for a long time. Sometimes other offices will hold sales for these things. Usually, these sales offer lots of bargains. Keep your eye out for notices about the sales of Lost and Found offices. These sales are usually not well advertised, so it is a good idea to ask a Lost and Found office when they anticipate holding a sale.
Ethics of Acquiring Lost Objects
Of course, there is a code of ethics about the use of lost items. If a pair of gloves, an umbrella, scarf or jacket has a nametag, we are obligated to contact the owner. We would want others to do the same when they find something that we have lost. However, if a lost item does not have a nametag, the finder might as well put it to good use. If a person recognizes a lost thing that you now use as actually belonging to him or her, you would – of course – turn it over to the owner.
But because memory is often poor for possessions like gloves, umbrellas, scarves or jackets – or because people are often too proud to admit that they forgot something and left it behind – you most likely will be able to keep the found item. If you think that the owner might return to try to find what was lost, put a notice near where you found the item that you found it and your contact information. If you get no calls for a month or two, you might as well use the jacket, umbrella or gloves.
Note: I thank Charles Hopkins, ISU Emeritus Professor of Education, for advising me on the topic of lost umbrellas.

December 05, 2007 06:43 pm

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Don’t let others profit from your memory failures

We all are forgetful on occasion. Some of us are more forgetful than others. If our forgetting inconveniences someone else, we hope that they will not be angry and will forgive our lapse. However, in addition to the possible anger or forgiving, there is another way someone might respond to our memory failure. Some people may choose to profit from our lapse. This column will examine how we can keep others from doing so successfully.
A common way others may take advantage of us when we forget involves borrowing and lending. We will examine three ways others can profit if we forget to return what we borrowed or forget to get others return what we lent them. First, we will consider the advice to never borrow or lend, and how doing so protects us from others exploiting us when our memory fails. Second, we will consider how to protect us when circumstances compel us to borrow something from someone. Third, we will consider how to protect us when circumstances compel us to lend something to someone.

Never a Borrower or Lender Be
In about 1841, Ralph Waldo Emerson recommended that we never borrow money or things from other people. He also recommended that we never lend things to others. He made these recommendations for a couple reasons. He advised not borrowing so that we would not take on too much debt. He advised not lending so that we would not lose what we own to others.
However, in my opinion, Emerson was also thinking of the weakness of human memory and how we may forget our borrowing and lending. If we borrow some thing or some money and we forget to return it, we may be embarrassed when we are reminded that we have not returned what we borrowed. Failure to pay one’s debts is considered irresponsible and can even lead to legal problems. Alternatively, if we lend some money or some thing and forget having made this loan, we may never get back what we loaned. This may happen ifs the person has a bad memory too and forgets as well to return what we loaned them.
Unavoidable Borrowing
Despite trying to not borrow from others, we sometimes are in a situation where we need some thing or some money and we have to borrow it. For example, we might feel we have an immediate need for some cash or we will suffer negative consequences. In such a difficult situation, we may feel that we have to ask for a loan. For example, suppose we need a quarter to put in the parking meter in order to park our car and to go to an important meeting that is starting in five minutes. We discover that we don’t have a quarter but someone with us does and offers it to us. If we don’t accept this loan, we will have to find another parking spot farther away and be late for the meeting. Who among us would not take the quarter and feed the meter. However, accepting this loan requires us to remember to repay this loan in a timely manner.
Some people, if dishonest, may see an opportunity to take advantage of someone who has borrowed something. Someone who is dishonest and who knows our memory is poor may later tell us that we actually owed them a dollar and a quarter. If this person is a good liar, they might say that we also borrowed a dollar that day for lunch. If enough time has passed, we might be unsure of just how much we borrowed on an occasion because it occurred quite a while ago. Who among us would be certain of the exact amount of money we borrowed on some occasions in the distant past. If we believe what this (dishonest) person tells us, we will pay them the extra dollar and they will have profited from our poor memory.
Unavoidable Lending
Sometimes we know that someone else is in a jam. For example, we know a person who has an important meeting and this person desperately needs a quarter to put in a parking meter. If we have a quarter, who among us would not offer it as a loan so that this person could park and make his or her meeting? Of course, having made this loan entitles us to later to ask this person, often repeatedly, to give the quarter back to us.
Unfortunately, if the person to whom we loaned money is dishonest, and we forget having made this loan, then this person may deliberately “forget.” In the case of the parking meter example, the person is a little richer (albeit, only 25 cents).
Deliberate forgetting of debts and loans is a kind of stealing. People who do this are con artists where the con involves memory. Professionals in this form of theft know a lot about the psychology of memory for debts and loans. For example, they know that loans for change are forgotten more easily than loans for a number of dollars. Similarly, they also know that small loans are forgotten more easily than large loans. This principle can be extended to objects. Loans of inexpensive objects (a hammer, a pad of paper) are forgotten more often than expensive objects (for example, a vacuum cleaner, a tape recorder or ipod).
Unfortunately, it is doubtful that memory con artists will ever be arrested and sent to jail. They have a perfect defense: they will invariably say that they, like others, forgot the debt or loan. So when borrowing and lending is unavoidable, take care to remember the debt or loan. Notes are the best way to keep from being the victim or a memory con artist. So, to keep track of your debts and loans, write them down as soon as possible and keep these notes someplace safe.

November 07, 2007 09:27 pm

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A Sharper Mind: Learning how to get a bright idea

In the past, this column has discussed the factors that facilitate problem solving and critical thinking. For example, such factors include understanding a problem in the first place, ignoring solutions tried previously, avoiding being fixated on a solution to a similar problem and by overloading one’s brain. In this column, we will consider a special kind of problem: coming up with a bright idea — one that will come up with the big idea that will solve some problem important to you, society, or your significant other
Bright ideas are ones that solve a problem that is important to you and has resisted solution. Some bright ideas are famous, such as the invention of the light bulb by Edison (certainly a bright idea, no joke intended). Some bright ideas address mundane problems (such as how to make a certain appliance work). If you learn something from this column that makes you a lot of money, there is no need to mail some of it to me (although I am not opposed to you doing that); just give it to your favorite charity. Here we first discuss what defines a solution as bright. Then we will examine a couple of formulas for coming up with this kind of idea. Finally, we will consider the bottom line of a bright idea, whether it is truly useful.
What is a Bright Idea?
When someone comes up with a bright idea (such as writing this column on this topic), it is generally regarded as creative. One characteristic of a creative idea is that it is deviant. By deviant, I mean that the idea is unusual. No one else has thought of the creative idea before.
Unfortunately, deviance is not sufficient for making an idea bright. The other critical characteristic of a bright idea is that it is useful. Obviously an idea is not bright if it does not solve a problem. Interestingly enough, ideas can be misleading in this regard. An idea may seem to be useful in some situations but later turn out to be useless or even counterproductive.
Incubation Theory
This theory holds that bright ideas originate in our unconscious. We are conscious that we have a problem but we are not conscious of its solution. (If we are conscious of its solution, a problem no longer exits.)
The solution comes about magically because our mind works on the problem unconsciously until it develops a solution. The development of a bright idea occurs much like baking a cake. Another analogy is the creation of a child in the womb. The bright idea is borne out of a process of incubation that comes up with the solution. Once the solution is conceived, it emerges out of the unconscious into the light of conscious thought.
Of course, sometimes nothing comes out of the incubation process. Consequently, people have attempted to formulate procedures that make it more likely that incubation will produce a bright idea. Different procedures have been proposed for making incubation work. One well-known theory advises that we immerse ourselves in all information that is relevant to the problem and then move on to doing other unrelated things. If we have done a good job of preparing our unconscious and if our unconscious is as ingenious as we suspect, a bright idea will eventually emerge.
Another procedure for rendering a idea bright is to sleep on it. Again we begin by immersing ourselves in all relevant information about the problem. Then we go to sleep. With luck, we wake up with the solution.
Sometimes when we sleep on an idea, we may have a dream that includes the solution. Sometimes the solution will come to us while we are partially awake. For example, a solution can come while drowsy — when we are not fully conscious as we got to sleep or as we awake. Because drowsiness can lead to bright ideas, daydreams are also known to prod an idea out of us.
A more deliberate way to generate a bright idea is brainstorming. With this procedure, we devote time to trying to think of all kinds of solutions to a problem. Brainstorming supposedly works best when we attempt to wildly generate ideas with others, such as colleagues, friends and family in order to produce the solution.
Usefulness theory
The funny thing about ideas is that they sometimes feel like they are bright (or that we are bright) but it turns out that we were wrong. Sometimes we have the feeling that we are brilliant because we have come up with a bright idea. Unfortunately, that feeling can be an illusion. The only way we can be sure that an idea is bright is by testing it.
Unfortunately, some bright ideas are only just that — bright — but actually not useful. There are many examples of seemingly bright ideas that turn out not to be bright. Chamberlain, a former prime minister of England, thought he had conceived of the bright idea to save England from Hitler’s war machine by getting Hitler to agree to a treaty that promised peace to England. Well, we know now that his idea was not so bright. Another example of a seemingly bright idea is the prefrontal lobotomy. When it was first proposed to the world, the prefrontal lobotomy was held as a cure for the severe mental illness of schizophrenia. Later it was discovered that the prefrontal lobotomy did not cure schizophrenia. It did keep people from exhibiting bizarre behavior but it did so by turning a person into a vegetable. Consequently an idea that seems bright in the first place may turn out not to be so bright with the passage of time.

October 03, 2007 05:30 pm

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A Sharper Mind: Reminiscences of meals past

Much of our lives are spent eating. As a result, we have many memories of breakfast, lunch or dinner, as well as for in between snacks. Sometimes we may want to remember what we ate on a certain occasion. This column considers what is the best way to recover the memory of what was eaten.
Some people claim that the sense of smell is the most powerful aid to memory. A French author, Marcel Proust, claimed that the smell of a certain cake activated a memory from his youth of a similar cake prepared by his mother. He claimed that the smell of the cake transported him back in time to when he enjoyed this cake with his mother. Proust's account of his smell experience has been cited by many people as demonstrating that smell provides the quickest access to our memory of food and the past in general.
Alternatively, other people feel that taste is more important to meal memory. Reminisce on the last steak, apple pie, or soup you had. Chances are that your reminiscence will focus on taste. So it might be plausibly argued that taste is more memorable than smell.
But is it the smell or the taste that elicits memories? This column examines which of these two senses results in a richer and more durable memory. Some people might feel that the answer to this question will primarily be of interest to cooks and chefs. But it also is important to any of us who cherish the memory of meals past. Below, we will consider the memorability of smell, then taste, and then flavor (which is the combined effect of a food’s smell and taste).
Smell
The smell of food can activate memories of meals long forgotten. Smells can elicit a meal memory, even in the absence of a taste. There are a couple of reasons why smells are memorable. Smells elicit the memories of meals because the perception of smells is very accurate in the first place. The chemical receptors in the nose are specific to different odors. In addition, the power of smell to elicit memories also can be attributed to the fact that neural connections from the sense receptors in one’s nose to the perception center of the brain are shorter than the neural connections of other senses to this center. The memories elicited by a smell are often vivid, clear and striking. Leaving food aside, smells activate all kinds of memories. For example, perfumes catch one’s attention and remind one of past interactions with the person who wears the perfume. Similarly, the exhaust of cars and factories can be recalled (us Hauteans are well aware of industrial odors).
A lot of research has been done on smell by humans. This research confirms the observation that smell alone activates memories easily. However, you should know that there is a drawback to this power of smell. Smells tends to stimulate the recall of just certain memories. For example, the smell of roast chicken may take you back mentally to a certain meal in your past. However, if you are trying to remember another meal when you had roast chicken, you may be drawn to other meals of roast chicken that you have had. Consequently, a smell cannot be depended on to activate the memory of the roast chicken that you want.
Taste
By itself, taste is not a very good cue to one’s memory of a meal. Recall the difficulty of tasting something when you have a cold. Taste is not a very good cue to memory for a few reasons. To begin with, taste does not elicit meal memories very easily because its perception is not very accurate in the first place.
You may know that different parts of the tongue are responsible for certain tastes. Recent science says that the localization of taste on the tongue is not as precise as once thought. Instead, the taste of something we have eaten involves all areas on the tongue. Also, the degree and kind of stimulation of the tongue depends on how much one is salivating. Variation in the degree and kind of stimulation leads to differences in what taste is registered in memory. Later, when we try to remember something eaten, our success at remembering will depend on whether the taste present in our mouth matches the original taste. In addition, taste is not very effective in eliciting memories because the neural connections from the sense receptors in one’s tongue to the perception center of the brain are longer than the neural connections of the sense of smell.
An exception to the poor memory for taste is poison. For example, rats (the rodent kind) quickly register in memory that a certain taste was experienced just before having the awful feeling that occurs when being poisoned. Rats (and people) who survive being poisoned acquire a taste aversion — the tendency to avoid the taste of poisoned food. Unfortunately, we do not know as much as we would like about taste aversion in humans. Most research on memory for taste has been done with rats because it is difficult to recruit humans for research on taste aversion.
Flavor
Because flavor results from the combined effect of smell and taste, it provides a powerful stimulus for memory. As a rule, two cues to memory are better than one. Together, smell and taste cues allow for more variety in the nature of memories remembered. Proust wrote that it was the smell that elicited the memory of his mom’s cake. However, it is likely that both taste and smell would have elicited his memory of her cake better than smell alone. If he had had a cold that day, he probably would not have even thought about her cake — no matter how delicious it was.

September 05, 2007 05:26 pm

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