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National Geographic
17-06-2025
- Health
- National Geographic
Yes, you can teach yourself to forget. And here's why you should
Earlier this year, 20-year-old Vishvaa Rajakumar memorized 80 random numbers in 13.5 seconds—roughly six numbers per second. This feat helped him win the Memory League World Championship, a tournament that pushes memory to its extremes. In another challenge, participants memorized the order of an entire shuffled deck of cards. Even if your memorization skills wouldn't win an international competition, having an above-average memory is considered a prize. Nearly three-quarters of adults say they play games like crossword puzzles not only for fun, but to improve their memory. After all, having a good memory is associated with sharpness and intelligence, while aforgetfulness is a quality linked to scatterbrains and mental decline. But as I've learned from cognitive scientists, an outsized spotlight on memory can lead us to neglect that forgetting is an equally important skill. Without forgetting, our minds would be cluttered with unnecessary, outdated, and sometimes emotionally painful information. And while, most of the time, forgetting happens outside our awareness, scientists have learned that people can have a surprising amount of control over what we don't want to remember. Indeed, forgetting is a skill we can foster to influence well-being, creativity, and change what we fundamentally know about ourselves. Some psychologists are now teaching forgetting as a tool to help with symptoms of depression or anxiety. And as technology like our phones or social media take on a larger role in what we remember, it may be a critical time to not only boost our memories but become better forgetters too. Why forgetting is good for us We start to forget as soon as we begin to remember, said Jonathan Fawcett, a cognitive neuroscientist at the Memorial University of Newfoundland, and this is a good thing. Take the example of Russian journalist Solomon Shereshevsky, who had an extraordinary capacity to rapidly remember minute details, even phrases in a foreign language and meaningless mathematical formulas . But he also had trouble concentrating with so many memories swirling around in his head. At times, Shereshevsky desired to forget so badly that he would write down a memory and then light the paper ablaze in an attempt to clear his mind. It was no use. 'Not even fire could wipe out the traces he wanted to obliterate,' the neurologist A.R. Luria, who studied Shereshevsky, wrote. Most of us don't have to resort to such destruction. Forgetting is usually mindless. We form vivid memories by paying attention to details that will prove to be useful in the future, while information we don't attend to or that we don't need to know doesn't get encoded. Even when a memory is formed, it can be later lost through forgetting processes when a memory weakens over time, or through interference—when newer memories compete with older memories, updating or replacing them. Such forgetting takes place without any effort, and sometimes without an explicit desire to forget, like when you can't find your keys because you weren't paying attention to where they were placed. But people partake in a more intentional kind of forgetting on a daily basis, said Michael Anderson, a cognitive psychologist and neuroscientist at The University of Cambridge. Motivated forgetting, as it's also called, takes place when someone has a vested interest in not remembering something. How to forget Researchers find a person can either stop a memory from forming in the first place, or stop an unwanted memory from surfacing, weakening it. Fawcett has shown how to accomplish the former in 'directed forgetting' experiments. In the lab, people are shown a list of words, followed by the directions to forget or remember them. It's that easy. In the end, participants have a better memory for the words they were told to hang on to, and a worse memory of the words they were told to forget. The 'forget' words weren't committed to memory simply because participants were told they wouldn't need them later. In our everyday lives, of course, there aren't directions telling us what to remember and what to discard. But the exercise shows that it's possible to encounter a piece of non-useful information, and intentionally let it go. Another kind of motivated forgetting is when people selectively choose to remember certain memories over others that are similar—strengthening the chosen memory and leading to an atrophy of the less favoured one. This is called 'retrieval-induced forgetting,' and through it, people can shape their own life stories. For example, imagine an embarrassing karaoke night where you fell off the stage during a rendition of Pink Pony Club. If you talk about that evening with your friends, but avoid talking about the stumble, over time, more positive aspects of the experience would grow into a more prominent memory. You might remember hitting the high note while belting 'I'm just having fun,' or your friends' laughter over the bruises. 'By selectively choosing what to think about and what to recall, we actually change our own internal self-narrative,' Fawcett said. People are more likely to remember information that matches what they believe about themselves. If you consider yourself to be reliable, you will remember all the times you brought your sick friend soup, and now how you forgot your mom's birthday. Those memories then reinforce your self-image as a reliable person. Another common form of motivated forgetting occurs when older memories are suppressed after being triggered by a reminder. For example, you might see a car that looks like your ex-partner's. Normally that would trigger you to painfully remember a past romantic road trip. But instead of dwelling on the past, researchers find you can quickly push that memory out of your mind. Anderson came up with an experiment to study this inhibitory memory process in what he called 'think, no-think experiments.' He asked people to remember pairs of words, like lawn and beef, and consider one to be a cue for the other. Then he would tell certain participants to try not to remember the word beef when they saw the word lawn. Anderson has compared this kind of forgetting to stopping a physical action; if you reach out and touch a hot pan handle, the next time you grab for it, you may catch yourself before you do. 'Stopping cognition is every bit as important as stopping action,' he said. And in fact, when Anderson and his colleagues looked at people's brain activity during 'think, no-think' tasks, they observed an inhibitory process that looked similar to stopping a physical movement. Stopping your hand from reaching out to touch a hot handle sends a signal going from the prefrontal cortex to the movement areas of the brain. When a person stopped a memory, a signal was sent instead to the hippocampus, the brain's memory center. Stopping a memory in this way had later consequences for forgetting. After shoving those memories away, they started to diminish. In a study from 2023, Anderson and his colleagues successfully trained participants to stop thinking about worries—past and future— about the COVID-19 pandemic. In more 'think, no-think experiments,' people came up with reminder words paired with disturbing thoughts, like the memory of visiting a family member in the hospital. When people were cued with their reminders—the word breathing, for example— they were told to either think about their memory, or to not think about it. After a three-day training, the 'no-think' groups reported less detailed and less emotionally urgent memories than the 'think' group. 'It suggests that people can become better at intentional forgetting,' Fawcett said. 'They can effectively be trained to do it.' Three months later, the participants' memories were still less upsetting, and 80 percent of them said they were still practicing thought suppression techniques. Yes, forgetting can be that easy If it seems too easy to just tell yourself not to remember something, some of Anderson's study participants certainly thought so too. 'I couldn't believe how effective it was,' one told the researchers three months after the study ended. 'I always thought that just dismissing thoughts would make things worse.' The social psychologist Daniel Wegner suggested that asking people not to think of something—like a white bear—would make them think about it more. But Anderson's work has shown that this isn't always the case. Still, Anderson said that motivated forgetting is a kind of skill, one that takes effort and practice, and comes more naturally to some people. Taking the time to master it could be worth it for mental health benefits, he says. In his COVID study, people who began the study with higher levels of anxiety reported larger improvements in measurements of anxiety, negative emotions, and depression after it was over. And past studies have found that those who performed better on 'think, no-think' tasks had less distressing intrusive memories after watching a violent movie. In 2020, a study found that the survivors of the 2015 terrorist attack in Paris who did not have PTSD tended to be better at memory suppression than those who did. 'We all have experiences that are negative,' Fawcett said, like embarrassing yourself at karaoke, or calling someone by the wrong name. 'The brain has mechanisms which are capable of pushing those thoughts out of mind.' Is technology changing how we forget? The brain can push thoughts out, but increasingly, technology is letting some slide back in. One recent afternoon, my iPhone lit up with a notification: 'You have a new memory.' A few seconds later, I was watching a slideshow titled 'Back in the Day' of me smiling in front of taxidermied animals at the Philadelphia Natural History Museum while instrumental music played. Before the notification, if you asked me if I've ever visited the museum, I would have recalled and said 'yes.' But the details of the dioramas, and how many I had posed with, had slipped my mind. I felt annoyed that my phone had been right: it was like a new memory, because I had forgotten it. When our phones surface an old photo, it likely makes the memory of the event stronger, says University of California Irvine psychologist Benjamin Storm. Perhaps after years of pushing the stumble off the karaoke stage out of your mind, your iPhone goes ahead and reminds you right about it! On the other hand, a phone memory may dull similar memories associated with that event, which you did not photograph. Storm wondered what aspects of my Philadelphia trip I may have forgotten since I engaged with the photo album my phone made for me. The impact of this was probably benign, but other curatorial choices could have bigger ripple effects on a person's memory. In 2022, journalists at the tech website 9to5Mac reported that iPhone 'memories' were not including photos from sensitive locations, like Holocaust memorial sites. 'It's uncomfortable to think about how much power technologies have to potentially shape how we remember ourselves,' Storm said. As our phones bombard us with 'new' memories we would have forgotten, while keeping other memories concealed, it's even more important to sharpen our forgetting skills. People will probably always want to improve their memories, Fawcett said. But in the midst of practicing memory palace exercises, embrace being a good forgetter too. Outside of easing anxiety and shaping our sense of self, forgetting makes our memories flexible. In turn, this mental fuzziness might be what makes us creative, suggests Steve Ramirez, a National Geographic Explorer and neuroscientist at Boston University. 'We can begin to use memories as building blocks, to combine and recombine them in new ways, to predict an uncertain future,' he said. How could we ever come up with new ideas, if our brains were full of rigid unforgettable old ones? You shouldn't try to forget every negative experience you've ever had, Anderson warned, but recognize that you are capable of, and likely already doing, a lot of motivated forgetting. It may not win you any impressive memory championships, but what you've forgotten is just as much a part of your life's story as what you're proud to remember. This article is part of Your Memory, Rewired, a National Geographic exploration into the fuzzy, fascinating frontiers of memory science—including advice on how to make your own memory more powerful. Learn more.
San Francisco Chronicle
28-05-2025
- Science
- San Francisco Chronicle
Texas' annual reading test adjusted its difficulty every year, masking whether students are improving
(The Conversation is an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts.) Jeanne Sinclair, Memorial University of Newfoundland (THE CONVERSATION) Texas children's performance on an annual reading test was basically flat from 2012 to 2021, even as the state spent billions of additional dollars on K-12 education. I recently did a peer-reviewed deep dive into the test design documentation to figure out why the reported results weren't showing improvement. I found the flat scores were at least in part by design. According to policies buried in the documentation, the agency administering the tests adjusted their difficulty level every year. As a result, roughly the same share of students failed the test over that decade regardless of how objectively better they performed relative to previous years. From 2008 to 2014, I was a bilingual teacher in Texas. Most of my students' families hailed from Mexico and Central America and were learning English as a new language. I loved seeing my students' progress. Yet, no matter how much they learned, many failed the end-of-year tests in reading, writing and math. My hunch was that these tests were unfair, but I could not explain why. This, among other things, prompted me to pursue a Ph.D. in education to better understand large-scale educational assessment. Ten years later, in 2024, I completed a detailed exploration of Texas's exam, currently known as the State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness, or STAAR. I found an unexpected trend: The share of students who correctly answered each test question was extraordinarily steady across years. Where we would expect to see fluctuation from year to year, performance instead appears artificially flat. The STAAR's technical documents reveal that the test is designed much like a norm-referenced test – that is, assessing students relative to their peers, rather than if they meet a fixed standard. In other words, a norm-referenced test cannot tell us if students meet key, fixed criteria or grade-level standards set by the state. In addition, norm-referenced tests are designed so that a certain share of students always fail, because success is gauged by one's position on the 'bell curve' in relation to other students. Following this logic, STAAR developers use practices like omitting easier questions and adjusting scores to cancel out gains due to better teaching. Ultimately, the STAAR tests over this time frame – taken by students every year from grade 3 to grade 8 in language arts and math, and less frequently in science and social studies – were not designed to show improvement. Since the test is designed to keep scores flat, it's impossible to know for sure if a lack of expected learning gains following big increases in per-student spending was because the extra funds failed to improve teaching and learning, or simply because the test hid the improvements. Why it matters Ever since the federal education policy known as No Child Left Behind went into effect in 2002 and tied students' test performance to rewards and sanctions for schools, achievement testing has been a primary driver of public education in the United States. Texas' educational accountability system has been in place since 1980, and it is well known in the state that the stakes and difficulty of Texas' academic readiness tests increase with each new version, which typically come out every five to 10 years. What the Texas public may not know is that the tests have been adjusted each and every year – at the expense of really knowing who should 'pass' or 'fail.' The test's design affects not just students but also schools and communities. High-stakes test scores determine school resources, the state's takeover of school districts and accreditation of teacher education programs. Home values are even driven by local schools' performance on high-stakes tests. Students who are marginalized by racism, poverty or language have historically tended to underperform on standardized tests. STAAR's design makes this problem worse. On May 28, 2025, the Texas Senate passed a bill that would eliminate the STAAR test and replace it with a different norm-referenced test. As best as I can tell, this wouldn't address the problems I uncovered in my research. What still isn't known I plan to investigate if other states or the federal government use similarly designed tests to evaluate students. My deep dive into Texas' test focused on STAAR before its 2022 redevelopment. The latest iteration has changed the test format and question types, but there appears to be little change to the way the test is scored. Without substantive revisions to the scoring calculations 'under the hood' of the STAAR test, it is likely Texas will continue to see flat performance.
National Observer
07-05-2025
- Politics
- National Observer
Smith talks separatism while Carney visits White House
While Prime Minister Mark Carney met with US President Donald Trump, Alberta's premier was making waves with talk about separatist sentiments in the province. 'I personally still have hope that there is a path forward for a strong and sovereign Alberta within a united Canada,' Alberta Premier Danielle Smith said in a speech livestreamed as Carney was arriving in Washington on Monday. Smith said the government won't put a vote on separation from Canada on the referendum ballot, but if there is a successful citizen-led referendum petition, the question would come up in the 2026 provincial referendum. 'The vast majority of these individuals are not fringe voices to be marginalized or vilified. They are loyal Albertans,' Smith said. 'They're frustrated, and they have every reason to be.' Many First Nations leaders in Alberta have slammed Smith for enabling a referendum on separatism and 'attempting to manufacture a national unity crisis.' "Alberta did not exist when our ancestors agreed to share the land with the Crown,' read the letter sent by Sturgeon Lake Cree Nation Chief Sheldon Sunshine and Mikisew Cree First Nation Chief Billy-Joe Tuccaro. Talking about Alberta separatism as a credible stance is a 'very risky thing to do politically" for the premier, said Memorial University of Newfoundland professor Russell Williams 'The province has no authority to supersede or interfere with our treaties, even indirectly by passing the buck to a 'citizen' referendum." Tuccaro and Sunshine went on to invite Canadians who 'are not happy living on Treaty lands' to apply for citizenship elsewhere. When asked by a reporter about how a separatist referendum would violate Treaties 6, 7 and 8, Smith said, 'I guess I have to wait and see what kind of question comes forward from citizens before I would be able to make a judgment about whether or not it would impact rights. But what I have said is that you can't vote away treaty rights.' Russell Williams, an associate professor at Memorial University of Newfoundland, said this is part of a recurring theme of Smith 'undermining the Team Canada approach' to the detriment of Canada and Alberta. 'It is absolutely the worst possible moment for her to be engaging in these stunts … it feeds narratives that may make it harder for Canada to manage Trump and get a good deal,' Williams said. Talking about Alberta separatism as a credible stance is a 'very risky thing to do politically" for the premier, he said. 'Either that will continue to be a very minority opinion, which is not good for her. Or she'll make it a more serious opinion, which means it's largely a bargaining stunt to try and get policy wins from Ottawa, [and] could end up backfiring in her face,' Williams said. 'The fact that Donald Trump is standing there looking for division in Canada makes it really an unfortunate strategy for her to take.' A day after the federal election, Smith's government tabled legislation that would make it easier for citizens to trigger a provincial referendum, lowering the required signatures from 20 per cent of registered voters to 10 per cent and granting an extra month to collect signatures. During her speech Monday, Smith announced the creation of a 'special negotiating team' to represent Alberta in talks with the federal government 'in pursuit of a new Alberta accord with Canada.'. She said this team will request reforms to guarantee port access to tidewater off the Pacific, Arctic and Atlantic coast for Alberta energy and resources and demand the federal government abandon a slew of climate and environmental policies, including clean electricity regulations, the Impact Assessment Act, electric vehicle sales mandate, the industrial carbon price and oil and gas emissions cap. None of these demands are new. 'Should those negotiations fail and the economic attacks continue, Alberta didn't start this fight, but rest assured, we will finish it and come out of it stronger and more prosperous than ever,' Smith said.
CNN
22-04-2025
- Health
- CNN
Teen use of cannabis edibles increases 43% after legalization in Canada, study finds
Legalization of cannabis products may be linked to growing use among teens, a new study found. Teen use of cannabis rose 26% in Canadian provinces that legalized the sale of edibles and extracts in October 2019, according to the study, which published Friday in the journal JAMA Network Open. Edible use increased 43%, raising concerns about youth-friendly forms of the drug, such as cannabis chocolates, candies, sodas and desserts — the same products responsible for a growing number of child hospitalizations in the US. Based on surveys of more than 106,000 students aged 12 to 17 years old, the study found use remained stable in Quebec, where the sale of these products was still banned. Canada legalized dried cannabis use in October 2018, and all Canadian provinces except Quebec followed a year later by legalizing the sale of cannabis edibles and extracts. While Canada's 2018 law prohibits the sale of cannabis to individuals under 18, the study suggests legalization could have made these products more accessible to teens and influenced their attitudes surrounding use. Canadian laws require child-resistant, plain and clearly labeled packaging for cannabis edibles, but illicit products sold online and by unauthorized distributors often look like other snacks, according to the study. 'This finding is important in light of previous literature regarding potential long-term adverse health effects of cannabis use for adolescents,' said senior author Dr. Hai Nguyen, a professor in the School of Pharmacy at Memorial University of Newfoundland, in an email. Teens using cannabis products regularly are at a greater risk for developing dependency disorders later in life, according to neuroscientist Joshua Gowin, who was not involved in the study. 'Some (studies) suggest that cannabis use during adolescence, especially heavy use, could alter brain development,' said Gowin, an assistant professor of radiology at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. 'If you start using earlier, it may be harder to change that trajectory later on.' Cannabis use can affect parts of the brain that deal with attention, coordination, learning, decision-making and emotional regulation, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Use at an early age has been linked to mental health issues such as depression, anxiety, and a heightened risk of developing longer-lasting mental health disorders, such as schizophrenia, in adulthood. Despite these risks, the study found the students perceived less harm from occasional cannabis use because of its legalization. Using both cannabis and alcohol at the same time, which studies show can lead to higher and more frequent consumption of both, was 28% more prevalent after legalization as well. When it comes to social attitudes around drug use, causality is often complicated to prove, because laws can change in response to cultural changes as well, Gowin said. For this reason, other research methods beyond surveys can play an important role in understanding the effects of legalization for future policymaking decisions. Related video These 'Cannamoms' say weed helps them be better moms In the US, the relationship between adolescent use and legalization may be even more complex to study because of variations in state and local regulations, Gowin said. Federally, cannabis is illegal, but 47 states have legalized it for medical uses and 24 states for adult recreational purposes. Each state has its own laws about marketing, packaging and distribution of these products. Nguyen also noted his research only addresses short-term effects based on one point in time after legalization, so it's important to continuously study how use patterns evolve and reflect changes in the laws. In the meantime, Nguyen recommended policymakers focus on striking the right balance between adult access and teen protection. Further enforcement may be needed to crack down on marketing and packaging that appeals to younger people, he noted, and local regulators can ensure cannabis distributors are located an appropriate distance away from schools. 'It is also essential to invest in public education campaigns that raise awareness about the risks of cannabis use among adolescents,' Nguyen said, adding that multimedia public health campaigns, school-based awareness efforts and parent-child communication are all important prevention strategies. Parent-youth communication guides can help families have more informed conversations at home and navigate common misconceptions about edible use, Nguyen said. 'It's not about scaring people,' Gowin said. 'Honesty and truth can be at the forefront of the conversations and hopefully people can make up their own minds about what's the best thing for them, their families and their communities.'
Yahoo
22-04-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Teen cannabis use increased after legalization in Canada, study finds
If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health, help is available. Dial or text 988 or visit for free and confidential support. Legalization of cannabis products may be linked to growing use among teens, a new study found. Teen use of cannabis rose 26% in Canadian provinces that legalized the sale of edibles and extracts in October 2019, according to the study, which published Friday in the journal JAMA Network Open. Edible use increased 43%, raising concerns about youth-friendly forms of the drug, such as cannabis chocolates, candies, sodas and desserts — the same products responsible for a growing number of child hospitalizations in the US. Based on surveys of more than 106,000 students aged 12 to 17 years old, the study found use remained stable in Quebec, where the sale of these products was still banned. Canada legalized dried cannabis use in October 2018, and all Canadian provinces except Quebec followed a year later by legalizing the sale of cannabis edibles and extracts. While Canada's 2018 law prohibits the sale of cannabis to individuals under 18, the study suggests legalization could have made these products more accessible to teens and influenced their attitudes surrounding use. Canadian laws require child-resistant, plain and clearly labeled packaging for cannabis edibles, but illicit products sold online and by unauthorized distributors often look like other snacks, according to the study. 'This finding is important in light of previous literature regarding potential long-term adverse health effects of cannabis use for adolescents,' said senior author Dr. Hai Nguyen, a professor in the School of Pharmacy at Memorial University of Newfoundland, in an email. Teens using cannabis products regularly are at a greater risk for developing dependency disorders later in life, according to neuroscientist Joshua Gowin, who was not involved in the study. 'Some (studies) suggest that cannabis use during adolescence, especially heavy use, could alter brain development,' said Gowin, an assistant professor of radiology at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. 'If you start using earlier, it may be harder to change that trajectory later on.' Cannabis use can affect parts of the brain that deal with attention, coordination, learning, decision-making and emotional regulation, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Use at an early age has been linked to mental health issues such as depression, anxiety, and a heightened risk of developing longer-lasting mental health disorders, such as schizophrenia, in adulthood. Despite these risks, the study found the students perceived less harm from occasional cannabis use because of its legalization. Using both cannabis and alcohol at the same time, which studies show can lead to higher and more frequent consumption of both, was 28% more prevalent after legalization as well. When it comes to social attitudes around drug use, causality is often complicated to prove, because laws can change in response to cultural changes as well, Gowin said. For this reason, other research methods beyond surveys can play an important role in understanding the effects of legalization for future policymaking decisions. In the US, the relationship between adolescent use and legalization may be even more complex to study because of variations in state and local regulations, Gowin said. Federally, cannabis is illegal, but 47 states have legalized it for medical uses and 24 states for adult recreational purposes. Each state has its own laws about marketing, packaging and distribution of these products. Nguyen also noted his research only addresses short-term effects based on one point in time after legalization, so it's important to continuously study how use patterns evolve and reflect changes in the laws. In the meantime, Nguyen recommended policymakers focus on striking the right balance between adult access and teen protection. Further enforcement may be needed to crack down on marketing and packaging that appeals to younger people, he noted, and local regulators can ensure cannabis distributors are located an appropriate distance away from schools. 'It is also essential to invest in public education campaigns that raise awareness about the risks of cannabis use among adolescents,' Nguyen said, adding that multimedia public health campaigns, school-based awareness efforts and parent-child communication are all important prevention strategies. Parent-youth communication guides can help families have more informed conversations at home and navigate common misconceptions about edible use, Nguyen said. 'It's not about scaring people,' Gowin said. 'Honesty and truth can be at the forefront of the conversations and hopefully people can make up their own minds about what's the best thing for them, their families and their communities.'
