C/O Klaudia Piaskowska
An over-reliance on digital photos causes more harm than we may expect
By: Rankini Kulatilake, Contributor
From my first ultrasound to my high school graduation, my mother’s scrapbook has captured all my milestones. If anyone wanted to know my story, a simple look through that scrapbook would reveal everything. Yet, 18 years later, in the age of digital photographs and phones with multiple cameras, my mother still chooses to carry a disposable camera around to capture the excitement of the world around her.
Though digital photographs are quick and often high quality, it has caused meaningful pictures to have increasingly lost their uniqueness given the number of pictures that can be taken so quickly. This idea is based on the fact that we depend on digital photographs to remember the experience, notwithstanding the fact that we have an abundant amount of digital photographs, which can get easily lost in the abyss of our “Photos” app.
A study of undergraduate students was performed as a guided tour of a museum, prompting the students to take pictures of some objects and just simply observe others. The results? The students remembered fewer visual details about the photographed art, in comparison to the art they were asked to only observe.
The study found that this difference is due to our over-reliance on the camera, rather than our memory. Consequently, we lose small details and fail to activate the processes that allow us to remember these important details. In short, digital photographs lose their meaning due to our overdependence on the camera itself, causing us to forget important details that would enhance our memory of our experiences.
Digital photographs are easy to take, quick to save and you can easily take 100 pictures in the span of a mere two minutes. In 2018, an estimated one trillion photos were taken. This gargantuan number of photographs will only grow as time goes on. Even in our own phones, we have a flood of pictures.
But how many of those do we look back at? How many of those experiences do we remember? My camera roll is around 1,000 pictures; however, most of these would be collecting dust if they could. Very rarely will I look back on these pictures because there are simply too many of them and they all blend in together. Many of them have lost their significance as they’ve blended in with the excessive amount of random screenshots and memes I have stored.
In other words, though digital photos are efficient, the large quantity of them in our phones makes them easily forgettable and causes them to become virtually meaningless.
However, are physical photographs any better? With digital photographs, you can easily share them with your family members and friends who live far away. You’ll even have it there forever, no worrying over losing it or damaging the picture. Despite this, digital photos do not equal security. They can be lost just as easily as physical photographs, albeit in a different manner.
According to technology developer Vincent Cerf, our most fond and precious memories that are stored digitally risk being lost due to the rapidly evolving changes in digital technologies.
If we look to compact discs as an example, many used this as a storage unit for a variety of different media types. For a while, you could insert a CD on your laptop as they came with CD players built-in. However, most new laptops do not come with a CD player built-in. Similarly, with the USB, those important files are always easily corrupted and vulnerable to being lost.
This issue is not seen with physical prints, as photo printers have evolved from being at your local supermarket to mobile printers that you can carry in your bag and connect to a device. All in all, even though physical photographs cannot be as easily shared across vast distances as digital photographs, they can be securely stored and have withstood the rapid advancements of digital media technologies well.
Thus, the rise of digital photographs has caused photos to lose their meaning and significance. This is due to the fact that we remember less of our experiences when we rely on digital photos, as well as the fact that our digital photos are overflowing in our camera rolls. As well, digital photos are constantly vulnerable to the ever-changing media technologies.
That being said, we can easily capture every moment now, but does it really equate to a memorable and meaningful experience if you are merely viewing it through a phone screen? A picture may be worth a thousand words, but, oftentimes, a thousand words are just not needed.
The exam is sitting in front of you, mocking you. The blank spaces under the questions are cavernous, the scantron bubbles are – unlike your understanding – crystal clear, and when you look at your Casio, all the screen displays is “666” because you can’t remember a damned thing. But why not? Isn’t memory just like a computer’s desktop? Files stored neatly, right where you put them when you listened in lecture? This is a common misconception of memory.
As with many other common ideas of complex functions, the impression of memory is largely flawed.
Researchers like Terje Lømo, Gary Lynch and most recently Dr. Todd Sacktor, professor of physiology, pharmacology and neurology at the State University of New York, are unveiling what actually makes our memories along with how they stick and how to strengthen, and erase, everything you’ve ever stored in your mind.
Reconsolidation
Many people imagine memory to be a storage space, almost like a file cabinet, where you can go, look at whatever you need at that particular time, and then put it back in its place and leave it as it always was. We’ll call this File Memory. Not to say this doesn’t happen sometimes, but File Memory isn’t a complete explanation of how we remember.
Reconsolidation, a distinct process that maintains, modifies or consolidates memories, was first observed as early as 1968, and in recent years is beginning to be more complexly understood.
During reconsolidation, memories are actually moved out of long-term memory while you’re using it, thinking about it, or talking about it. They are then resaved again.
To liken it to the file cabinet analogy: when the memory is recalled, the file cabinet is destroyed, and the file is sent up for use, so you can alter it, strengthen it, and update it before it goes back. Then, when the memory is stored again, another file cabinet is built to hold it. But, this file cabinet may not be made the exact same way. It could be stronger, more complex, larger, and will be somewhat a little different than the last one.
Todd Sacktor, professor at the State University of New York, says of reconsolidation, “the whole idea of reconsolidation is that it both strengthens old memories – because it gets used again – and it updates the memories with new information.”
That’s why reading your notes the same day you took them can be so useful: you have an initial memory – you remember taking the notes and in what context they were taken - that you take out, build on, and reinforce before storing it again, this time more complexly and permanently.
Protein kinase M zeta (PKMzeta)
Even though the “File Memory” concept is largely inaccurate, we can find some similarities human memory has to that of a computer’s. In a computer, memory is stored through combinations of 0s and 1s. Though the information it stores is complex, it is constructed by those two basic blocks. This can also be compared to human genetics: DNA codes our entire genetic structure while itself being made up by four distinct chemicals.
Memory too, for all its complexity, is stored by one very basic building block: protein kinase M zeta, also known as PKMzeta. PKMzeta is what builds and keeps all types of memories in long-term storage, all over the brain.
With the presence of more of the enzyme, the result is stronger memories. This being said, conversely less of this enzyme means weaker, or no, memories.
The most well-known and illustrative proof of this resulted from a study by Sacktor, in partnership with the Israel Weizmann Institute of Science. The experiment consisted of having rats associate the action of intaking sugar water with discomfort, and then breaking them into three groups: one where PKMzeta was inhibited, one where PKMzeta was made to overexpress, and one control group.
A drug called zeta inhibitory peptide – ZIP – was administered to wipe the rats’ memory in the first group. ZIP does not even require the memory to be in the process of reconsolidation for it to work. Dr. Sacktor says of this “inhibiting PKMζ is like dissembling all one’s file cabinets, regardless of whether they are opened or not. After the drug has worn off, the pieces do not reassemble.” This was definitely observed in the experiment, and the rats were no longer wary of the sugar water.
In the group where PKMzeta was made to overexpress itself, the rats were even more afraid of the sugar-water than the control group. This phenomenon surprised Dr. Sacktor: “If you had a computer hard-disk and the 1 is the PKMzeta and the absence of PKMzeta is the 0, and then you randomly throw in a whole bunch of 1s into the hard-disk,” which is effectively what adding PKMzeta would do, “you’re going to degrade the information, just as you would by throwing in a whole bunch of 0s. But somehow if you throw some in – not a huge amount of 1s – there’s some aspect of the memory in which the 1s tend to go where the other 1s are, and then that makes the memory stronger. But it’s still pretty mysterious.”
Applications
As with most major scientific developments, the ability to wield the newfound knowledge often emerges much later, after the discovery.
“Once you understand the storage of information - even though it may take a couple of decades for that to change things – everything gets changed,” says Dr. Sacktor. “For example, when they figured out in 1955 the structure of DNA and convinced everyone that that was the genetic information, you could ask the same question ‘what difference does it make that we know that DNA is why some people’s eyes are blue and some people’s eyes are brown? We kind of knew that from Mendelian genetics anyway!’ It took decades before it actually made much of a difference for medicine.
I can’t predict what the real implications [of PKMzeta] are going to be. But it’s going to be something big.”
Already there is recognition of how many major applications this discovery could yield. Mild reconsolidation blockades have already been tested on subjects suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, results showing promise for the future of this technology.
Other applications could include helping addicts successfully kick their habit, healing some pain caused by central neuropathic pain syndrome (pain that is still felt, even after physical healing) and perhaps slow or stop the progress of degenerative diseases like dementia and Alzheimer’s.
It is clear that this development will lead us in the future of understanding and manipulating memory.
Dr. Sacktor puts it plainly when he says “I suspect the 2000s - this 10-15 year period - are going to be a golden age for understanding long-term memory.”
We won’t soon forget this groundbreaking discovery.
Memory retention is a lot like water retention, save for the fact that you do not want your memory being expelled from your body anytime soon.
When studying, researching or attempting to scrounge the details of a hazy Friday night, it is always beneficial to have an effective memory and be able to recall details that may be helpful in completing a test or assignment or recollecting drunken festivities among other school-related activities.
If you are looking to improve your memory skills, here are a few ingredients to look for when grocery shopping that will help keep your mind running smoothly.
Flavonoids
Not only is this word fun to say, the flavonoid compound has been proven to improve memory, learning and general cognitive function, decision making, verbal comprehension and numerical ability. So, calculus and communications students alike, take note: foods rich in flavonoids can help retain vital information and up the ante of your presentations and pop quizzes.
Add to your grocery list: blueberries, apples, cabbage, tomatoes; (look for labels with Quercetin and Anthocyanins, two common types of flavonoids)
Omega-3 Fatty Acids
Hearing the term “fatty acids” might turn you off from picking up an item with this ingredient, but Omega-3s are an essential part of human health and help with brain function and normal growth and development. When lacking in Omega-3s, common side effects include poor memory, fatigue, mood swings and depression. So keep up your levels of this fatty acid and reap the benefits of on the ball work habits. BONUS: it also helps reduce your risk of heart disease and inflammatory diseases such as arthritis.
Add to your grocery list: flax seeds, walnuts, salmon, tofu, shrimp and soy beans
B Vitamins
Vitamins B6, B9 and B12 have two things in common - they’re all divisible by three and they have all been noted to help improve memory and brain function. Vitamin B helps with the communication between the nervous system and the brain by forming and releasing neurotransmitters. These neurotransmitters help with concentration, awareness and mental clarity.
Add to your grocery list: yogurt, almonds, potatoes, mushrooms and whole grain cereals
