When it comes to the five senses, the brain's perception of the environment never ends, never stops for a minute. Memory in this case plays a primary role along with basic feelings. It has three parts: sensory, short-term and long-term. The first includes auditory memory, which comes into play when someone says something to you and you think that you do not understand the interlocutor, as a result you ask him again, but after a few seconds you realize that you did understand what was said.
Scientists have explained how we understand what we hear.
Echo memory features
Echo memory, also known as auditory storage, auditory register, or simply auditory memory, is a part of sensory memory that processes information from the external environment received by the 5 senses, especially hearing and sight.
When listening to almost any sound, the brain and echo memory start to work, storing it for an average of four seconds and creating an exact copy of it.
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During this time, audio information is processed for a better understanding of the interlocutor. Curiously, whether you paid attention or not, you remember hearing a certain noise.
How it happens in life
The most striking example of this is when someone asks you about something and your immediate response is, "Did you say something?" At the same time, after a few seconds, you are surprised to realize that you know what the interlocutor asked about. This is where auditory memory comes in.
Nevertheless, the brain has the ability to decide whether to store such a sound in the echo memory or not. It all depends on whether what is heard has an important context for the listener, forcing it to send information into short-term memory.
Testing your abilities
Here are some of the most common times we use echo memory, in terms of sounds that are stored in the brain and then transmitted to short-term memory. Check yourself:
- Ask someone's name and remember it without any problem.
- Repeat the long numbers just sounded.
- Remember the voice of the person who spoke to you.
- Repeat the melody of the song you just heard on the radio.
- Listen to the joke and repeat it.
Complete these easy tasks to understand how advanced your echo memory is. If you have any difficulties, keep in mind that you need to develop this area.
Echo memory allows a person to memorize more information in order to react more quickly to changes in the external environment.
Ekaterina M