24 korrents from this recording
Every claim below is a statement made in this recording, quoted word for word and linked to the second it was said, so you can hear it rather than take our word for it. The wording comes from the transcript published alongside the recording; the sentence above each quote is our reading of the claim, not their wording.
0:08:31 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsAnd I think that illustrates also how our memory works. That just seeing something many times doesn't mean you'll remember it well. And this is a classic demonstration that, you know, you've seen a penny many times. You don't remember all the features on the penny.
0:10:11 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsAnd so we've done this study where you have to, instead of me telling you where it is, you have to get up and find it. And so now you're engaging with the environment, you're going to go look for it and be like, gosh, it's been there the whole time. have walked by it so many times have never noticed it. And I think that's the difference between seeing something and noticing it.
0:23:44 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsHow can you make learning kind of uncomfortable, but that you'll remember things better? And it goes against a lot of our intuitions. A lot of teachers will want to say, how can we make learning easier? And I think that's probably the first problem is you don't want it to be easy.
0:26:26 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsthe research on photographic memory does show that even people who have very strong visual memory will make memory errors. So it's not that you know it's exactly photographic but their visual memory is exceptional.
0:27:45 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsNow, it can also make your memory worse because you're realizing I want to I'm taking this photo so I don't need to remember it later. And so, you could see it going both ways, but that selection process is important.
0:28:33 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsAnd our brain does a lot of interesting things in terms of, you know, reconstructing the past also has a similar brain signature as imagining the future. which you know in some ways makes sense. We shouldn't have separate parts of the brain for thinking about the past and thinking about the future.
0:31:17 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsAnd as a result of identifying that person in a lineup, that person then replaces what they actually saw. So our memory can be contaminated just like any form of evidence could be contaminated.
0:34:26 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsAnd sometimes confidence, high confidence doesn't necessarily mean high accuracy. And I think part of the reason we're fooled is usually, you know, the more you see something, the better you'll remember it, just like the Apple logo. But that's not always the case.
0:38:38 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsIt's as simple as you you need to know your hotel room number when you're staying there. But if I ask you your hotel room number a week later, it's gone. But that's good in a way because you're going to have other numbers to remember and other hotel room numbers to remember. So there's benefits of forgetting.
0:44:48 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsWhen you look at these investigations, the reason this happens is, you know, these are very responsible, very intelligent parents who will, you know, put their child in the car and then get in the car and then you just get in this mode of I'm going to work. I'm going to do my job and you're in this routine.
0:51:21 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsand you found that these nuns, how they aged, some of them certainly when they passed away, their brains had these kind of hallmark signs of dementia, plaques and tangles, but behaviorally they were still high functioning. So, it's really interesting that the hardware shows what we see as dementia and specifically Alzheimer's disease, but their behavior uh was that of a fairly healthy cognitive person.
0:52:34 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsBut in the walking group the group that was randomly assigned to walk three four times a week for 40 minutes compared to a stretching group who's still engaging in exercise but not cardiovascular exercise. The walking group their you know hippocamp is actually increased in volume by 1%. So you're changing the the brain, but you're also changing the behavior. Their memory was much better a year later.
0:54:33 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsAnd I think, you know, most people when they talk about aging, they're so worried about dementia and, you know, Alzheimer's disease as a specific form, but balance is even more important, I think. And most people aren't even aware of their balance.
0:56:16 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsWhat's interesting with balance is it's very trainable. And so, you know, there's parts of balance that involve visual inner ear, but if you engage in some training, and it can be as simple as standing on one leg or doing yoga or taichi, you can improve your balance considerably within a month or two.
1:04:39 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsthere's some interesting work on you know happiness being more curve linear like midlife is actually some of the lowest levels of happiness and life satisfaction
1:16:41 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsAnd actually, after the age of 40, most people feel about 20% younger than their actual age.
1:17:09 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsit's also interesting that that subjective age is a better predictor of how long you'll live than your biological age.
1:28:45 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsBut what we found, at least at the psychological level, we did some of this research, older adults were much more resilient than younger adults.
1:43:57 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsI think some research, again it's correlational, shows that people who spend, you know, 5 hours a week with their grandchildren have improved memory. So that seems we don't know if it's causal, but it's interesting that those who spend more than 20 hours a week don't show this benefit. In fact, might show the opposite.
1:47:46 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsAnd actually, more recent research shows that those who have a positive attitude live longer, they're less likely to develop dementia.
1:49:10 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsthese super aes are not extremists. They're not like running marathons and eating, you know, only blueberries.
2:00:07 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsAnd so, in this study on curiosity, we found that older adults tend to remember the things that they're most curious about, but they're also really good at forgetting the things that they just didn't care about in the first place.
2:03:08 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsBut her work has shown that when you give people different time perspectives, they make different choices. So if you unfortunately tell someone who's younger that they only have 5 to 10 years left to live, they're going to make choices very much like older adults too.
2:09:35 · watch on youtube.com↗
Their wordsbut as you get older that tends to decline with age which I thought was kind of perplexing because I you know a lot of curious people but we found that levels of state curiosity when I give you some interesting bit of information but I don't give you the answer if it's something you care about that actually increases with age your level of curiosity and learning.