Memory impairment in psychology: causes and treatment. Memory Features

Memory is a set of information in psychology that displays events, emotions, any knowledge that the individual has experienced before.

What is memory and its violation

Thanks to her, we have experience, and the person is the person that the people around him know. The loss of memory or its violation causes a great discomfort to the person.

Memory impairment in psychology is a fairly common disorder that brings a lot of problems to a person and, of course, worsens the quality of his life. Such a disorder underlies many mental illnesses.

The main types of memory disorders

There are two main types of violation of human memory.

Qualitative dysfunctions involve confusion in the patient's head, due to the inability to distinguish genuine memories from fantasies. The patient does not understand what events are real, and which are the fruit of his imagination.

Quantitative defects are displayed in the amplification or weakening of traces of memory.

There are a huge number of types of memory impairments. Most of them are characterized by short-term and reversible. They can be caused by such commonplace reasons as overwork, frequent stressful situations, abuse of medicines, and alcoholic beverages.

Others require a serious approach to treatment.

Causes of memory problems

What are these reasons that can cause memory impairment? In psychology, there are several such.

For example, the presence of an asthenic syndrome in a person, which is accompanied by rapid fatigue, exhaustion of the body. It can be a consequence of craniocerebral injuries, prolonged depressions, beriberi, alcohol and drug addiction.

In children, memory disorders are most often the result of underdevelopment of the brain, head trauma of a physical or mental nature. These children have problems with remembering information and its subsequent reproduction.

The memory features of children are such that the disorders manifest themselves mainly in the form of amnesia. Amnesia - the loss of individual memories. In children, it occurs as a consequence of the unfavorable situation in the family or in the children's institutions that they visit. Also, to the causes of amnesia can be attributed to frequent acute respiratory diseases and hypovitaminosis.

In addition, children's memory features are manifested in the fact that since birth it is constantly evolving, resulting in becoming vulnerable. Problem pregnancy and childbirth, as well as improper stimulation of the development of memory processes can lead to memory damage.

Diseases associated with blood supply to the brain, for example, diabetes mellitus, arteriosclerosis of vessels, Parkinson's disease affect memory.

Aging. If this physiological process does not involve serious illnesses, the memory deterioration is slow. At first, it becomes difficult for a person to recall long-standing events from life, and newer events and experiences are gradually eroding. The above diseases, as well as Alzheimer's, schizophrenia and neurosis, significantly increase memory impairment.

In psychology, there is such a term as '' repression ''. It means denial or special forgetting of a person especially difficult for him moments of life. This is a protective mechanism of the psyche.

Iodine deficiency and thyroid dysfunction increase the tendency to depression and apathy, which in turn is fraught with a violation of the memorization processes. Therefore, it is so important to properly make a diet in order to fully receive all the necessary vitamins and trace elements.

Memory as a psychological phenomenon

Memory is a function in psychology, which fixes, stores and reproduces various events and experiences, and also gives the ability to constantly replenish data and use existing experience.

As you know, depending on the functional load, there are several types of memory.

Types of memory

Image memory is that it allows you to capture various images in memory. The motor does the same, but with respect to movement. Emotional memory concentrates on the emotions experienced.

Symbolic is peculiar, but thanks to it we can remember words, thoughts, ideas. Short and long-term memory is known to everyone. The first one facilitates the memorization of a large amount of information for a short period of time, after which it is eliminated or a section of the long-term is transferred.

Arbitrary and involuntary memory. The first works thanks to a preliminary indication of memorization, and the second does it arbitrarily, without any commands.

For each of these species there is a memory impairment. In psychology, the Korsakov syndrome, for example, is a short-term memory disorder .

Types of memory disorders

What are the symptoms of memory impairment? This is a forgetting and impossibility of reproducing events from personal or another's experience.

Paramnesia is a loss of time, when an individual confuses the events of the past and the present, can not understand what events in his head took place in the real world, and what are fictitious, projected by the brain on the basis of information received at one time.

Dysmnesia is a disorder that includes hypermnesia, hypnosis and amnesia. The latter is characterized by the forgetting of individual information and skills for a certain period of time. Problems with memory are episodic, after which memories are partially or completely returned. Amnesia can also affect acquired skills, for example, the ability to drive a car, ride a bicycle, cook any dishes.

Types of amnesia

Retrograde amnesia is manifested in forgetting events for a certain period of time, preceding the occurrence of trauma. For example, a person injured head can forget everything that happened to him in a week or more before the accident.

Anterograde amnesia is the opposite of the previous one and implies a loss of memory for the gap after the injury.

Fixation amnesia is when the patient is unable to remember the incoming information. He quite adequately perceives the reality, but forgets the information in a few minutes or seconds after receiving it. This causes problems in the temporary orientation, as well as in remembering the surrounding people.

With total amnesia, a person is unable to recall anything from his past life. He does not know his name, age, address, who he is and what he did. As a rule, such a breakdown of the mental function of remembering comes after receiving a severe trauma to the skull.

Palimpsest occurs as a result of alcoholic intoxication, when an individual can not recall individual moments.

With hysterical amnesia, the person forgets the hard, painful or simply unprofitable memories. It is peculiar not only to mentally ill people, but also healthy, relating to a hysterical type.

Parameteria is a type of memory corruption in which emerging spaces are filled with different data.

Ekmnesia and cryptomnesia

Ekmnesia is a phenomenon when a person lives long past events as a phenomenon of the present time. It is typical of older people who begin to perceive themselves as a young person and are preparing for entering a university, a wedding or other events that were experienced at a young age.

Cryptomnesia is a disorder in which a person gives out ideas he has heard or read for his own, sincerely believing in his authorship. For example, patients read books of great writers in their imagination can be misappropriated by themselves, assuring others of this.

A type of cryptomnesia can be a phenomenon when a person perceives an event from his own life as read in a book or seen in a movie.

Treating memory impairments

Classification of memory disorders is a rather large amount of information in psychology, there are many works on the study of such phenomena, as well as the methods of their treatment.

Of course, it is easier to engage in preventive actions than the treatment itself. For this purpose, specialists have developed many exercises that allow you to keep your memory in good shape.

Proper nutrition and lifestyle also contribute to the normal functioning of the brain.

As for the direct treatment of memory disorders, it will depend on the diagnosis, the degree of neglect and the causes of the onset. Treatment with drugs begins only after a thorough diagnosis by a specialist doctor.