[News] Popular Songs Can Cue Specific Memories, Psychology Research Shows

[Moontanman]

Popular Songs Can Cue Specific Memories, Psychology Research Shows

ScienceDaily (Jan. 23, 2009) — Whether the soundtrack of your youth was doo-wop or disco, new wave or Nirvana, psychology research at Kansas State University shows that even just thinking about a particular song can evoke vivid memories of the past.

 

Popular Songs Can Cue Specific Memories, Psychology Research Shows

[pamela]

Songs and memory have a far greater potential, than just remembering good times. The songs you learned as a child, such as "conjunction Junction", and "interjection"from a popular PBS series, are still with you today. Not only in a great memory, but as quick reference learning tool.

After having multiple concussions over a few short years, the damage done to my temporal lobes was extensive.After many tests, my doctor informed me that my short term memory was permanently damaged and no possibility to correct it. Disillusioned, I painstakingly lived day in and day out, not remembering what I had done the day before, much less, sometimes hours before. Writing down key events and important things to be done, became a daily necessity.

In playing with my young child at that time, pulling from long term memory, I taught him the songs listed above. It occured to me, that song/memory association, might help my present situation.

From that point on, everything was made into a silly song. From meeting a new person, to information read. Now these songs were primarily sung in my head, for obvious reasons;) and written down, and of course sung to my son for the sheer comedy of it, and it started to take hold. Over the course of two years, my short term memory improved at a steady rate. And after many years now, silly songs a thing of the past, my short term memory has developed in such a manner, that it is far superior to my preconcussion days. I have often thought that this simple technique might be useful in helping Alzheimers patients and people suffering from amnesia.