Extending Cognition to External Agents

Nestojko, John F.; Finley, Jason R.; Roediger, Henry L.

doi:10.1080/1047840x.2013.844056

Cited by 40 publications

(21 citation statements)

References 32 publications

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“…The present study investigated the effect of cognitive offloading on A) unaided memory ability, and B) subsequent strategy choice in memory task requiring participants to maintain intentions over a brief delay. External memory is becoming crucial in today's life, but it is also changing how people use their own memory systems (Nestojko, Finley, & Roediger, 2013). Two alternative arguments can be found in the literature.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…On the one hand, offloading memory onto the environment can overcome the limited capacity of working memory, relieve the burden on prospective memory, and improve cognitive functioning (Finley et al, 2018). On the other hand, externally stored information may not always be a viable replacement for internal memory and excessive reliance on external memory sources may reduce flexible access to internally stored knowledge, impairing in turn higher order cognition (Nestojko et al, 2013). Similar concerns date back at least to the time of Socrates, who worried over 2000 years ago that the use of writing would "introduce forgetfulness into the soul of those who learn it: they will not practice using their memory because they will put their trust in writing" (Plato, approximately 370 BC/1995, p. 79).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The effect of recent reminder setting on subsequent strategy and performance in a prospective memory task

Scarampi

Gilbert

2020

Memory

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The effect of recent reminder setting on subsequent strategy and performance in a prospective memory task The technological advancement that is rapidly taking place in today's society allows increased opportunity for "cognitive offloading" by storing information in external devices rather than relying on internal memory. This opens the way to fundamental questions regarding the interplay between internal and external memory and the potential benefits and costs of placing information in the external environment. This article reports the results of three pre-registered online experiments investigating the consequences of prior cognitive offloading on A) subsequent unaided ability, and B) strategic decisions whether to engage in future cognitive offloading. We administered a web-based task requiring participants to remember delayed intentions for a brief period and manipulated the possibility of setting reminders to create an external cue. Earlier cognitive offloading had little effect upon individuals' subsequent unaided ability, leading to a small and nonsignificant drop in subsequent performance. However, there was a strong effect on participants' subsequent likelihood of setting reminders. These findings suggest that the short-term impact of cognitive offloading is more likely to be seen on individuals' strategy choices rather than basic memory processes.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The effect of recent reminder setting on subsequent strategy and performance in a prospective memory task

Scarampi

Gilbert

2020

Memory

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“…Offloading has also been studied under the name “transactive memory” (e.g., Nestojko, Finley, & Roediger, 2013; Wegner, 1987). According to Wegner and Ward (2013), a transactive memory partner is someone who shares a mental task with another person—for example, the spouse who always knows the location of their partner's phone, keys, or wallet or the colleague whose expertise fills in the gaps of their coauthor's literature review.…”

Section: Hypothesesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This is consistent with a study by Popov, Marevic, Rummel, and Reder (2019) who show that forgetting improves memory by freeing up working‐memory resources. In short, research suggests that offloading frees up immediate cognitive resources, which in turn improves the learning of new information and helps with decision‐making (see also Nestojko et al., 2013; Risko & Gilbert, 2016), which should be beneficial for political cognition. However, to date, no research has examined the political consequences of offloading.…”

Section: Hypothesesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Googling Politics: How Offloading Affects Voting and Political Knowledge

Kleinberg

Lau

2020

Political Psychology

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Studies suggest that individuals are less likely to process information they can easily look up. Instead of committing information to memory, they rely on the Internet to store information for them—a phenomenon known as “offloading.” We examine the effects of offloading on political knowledge and voting behavior. Using data from a 10‐wave panel experiment designed to study information processing in two distinct information environments, we demonstrate that people whose environment is conducive to offloading learn more during an election campaign than individuals whose information environment is not conducive to offloading, even though they look at less information during the campaign. Individuals in the offloading condition also make better vote choices despite examining less information. These results suggest that offloading reduces cognitive load, thereby freeing up processing space in working memory, which can increase learning of information that is accessed, and improve decision‐making.

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“…Importantly, relying on external memory is not new-humans strove for that long before the printing press, much less the internet (Heersmink, 2016;Nestojko, Finley, & Roediger III, 2013). Earlier cognitive research supported the hypothesis that the very awareness of external information storage possibilities may lead to reduced internal representations (Schönpflug & Esser, 1995).…”

Section: And Memorizationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Yes, Memorize

Henik

Bar-Hen-Schweiger²,

Milshtein³

et al. 2020

Mind Brain and Education

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The endless wealth of information on the internet sharpens the question: how much and what is really important for us to remember? This issue is related to questions regarding the core processes involved in reasoning and thinking. We present mental manipulation (MM) as the core of reasoning and examine the above-mentioned issue in light of MM's vital role in reasoning and problem-solving. WHAT IS MENTAL MANIPULATION? Richard Feynman, Nobel Laureate in Physics (in 1965), tells the following story (Feynman & Leighton, 1997). When he was a kid, he was known for fixing radios. One day a guy asked him to fix a radio that made tremendous noise when it was turned on. Feynman turned on the radio, heard the noise, and started thinking as he walked back and forth. "I realize that one way it can happen is that the tubes are heating up in the wrong order-that is, the amplifier's all hot, the tubes are ready to go, and there's nothing feeding in, or there's some back circuit feeding in, or … and therefore it's making a lot of noise … " The guy said, "You come to fix the radio, but you're only walking back and forth!" Feynman responded "I'm thinking!" and continued to describe his thinking to himself: " … take the tubes out, and reverse the order completely in the set." So, he changed the tubes around, stepped to the front of the radio, turned the thing on, and it is as quiet as a lamb: it [the radio] waits until it heats up, and then plays perfectly-no noise. The guy got Feynman other jobs, and kept telling everybody what a tremendous genius he was, saying, "He fixes radios by thinking!" "The whole idea of thinking, to fix a radio … he never thought that was possible." (pp. 19-20). Feynman actually describes a classical exemplar of mental manipulation (MM); he

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Extending Cognition to External Agents

Cited by 40 publications

References 32 publications

The effect of recent reminder setting on subsequent strategy and performance in a prospective memory task

The effect of recent reminder setting on subsequent strategy and performance in a prospective memory task

Googling Politics: How Offloading Affects Voting and Political Knowledge

Yes, Memorize

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