Short-Term Memory

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Your insights into short-term memory? What it is, what it isn't? How it may/may not play a role in autism, Asperger's, ADHD Inattentive, petit mal/absence and so on? Experiences?

I think Short term memory meant the ability to memorise things quickly, and I think short term memory problems are part of autism to an extent. I certainly have very bad memory problems to the extent of sometimes having to write down simplistic tasks such as 'Run Bath' or 'walk dog'. I have my Iphone set to go off at different times of the day to remind me when i have to eat.

The reason I think Short Term Memory problems are part of autism is because, Autistic people do not get social cue's and so memorising orders from other people may not stick or be picked up, i have often been called 'dense' by numerous NT's (I probably am). I also tend to think completely in the present tense, i do not usualy take the future into account when i carry things out or considor my feelings

Leekduck posted: I think Short term memory meant the ability to memorise things quickly, and I think short term memory problems are part of autism to an extent. I certainly have very bad memory problems to the extent of sometimes having to write down simplistic tasks such as 'Run Bath' or 'walk dog'. I have my Iphone set to go off at different times of the day to remind me when i have to eat. The reason I think Short Term Memory problems are part of autism is because, Autistic people do not get social cue's and so memorising orders from other people may not stick or be picked up, i have often been called 'dense' by numerous NT's (I probably am). I also tend to think completely in the present tense, i do not usualy take the future into account when i carry things out or considor my feelings - Leekduck - Thanks for sharing that. Yes, time: Future vs Present vs Past. In the general area of subtle brain injuries/concussions, there is evidence that an accident (example: car crash) can cause some persons to begin to live in the present vs the future. - http://www.biausa.org/ - In the area of religion, it has been observed that some ministers tend to live way in the past (such as in Biblical times) or way in the future (Jesus's coming/whatever) and almost never, ever in the present. Yes, writing down simplistic tasks actually helps some persons. - pgd

I actualy have had a psychological detail examination fo my Dyslexia, and the psychologist say that my dyslexia consists of verry weak short term memory.
I find it horribly difficult to remember codes and number combinations, names, what i was doing 10 sec ago, what i was gona do before i got slightly sidetracked, math in general. The psychiatrist said that shouldnt be able to complete base/grade school math and thus never finish it since math is one of the core subjects. I did manage, but it was so painfully hard i never wanna see a math test ever again.

I CAN however rember one thing, that conects to the next, that conects to the next so my chain of though stays intact.
Its when i need to remeber something (maby related to the subject, but) not conected to where im at, that i often just cant do it. And even thou i cant remember peoples names, i can rember their faces and characteristics and so on.

I am still wating to get my Aspergers fully diagnosed, so i dont know how my memory issues relates to it thou.

Supremelogic1 posted (in part): I actualy have had a psychological detail examination fo my Dyslexia, and the psychologist say that my dyslexia consists of verry weak short term memory. I find it horribly difficult to remember codes and number combinations, names, what i was doing 10 sec ago, what i was gona do before i got slightly sidetracked, math in general. The psychiatrist said that shouldnt be able to complete base/grade school math and thus never finish it since math is one of the core subjects. I did manage, but it was so painfully hard i never wanna see a math test ever again. I CAN however rember one thing, that conects to the next, that conects to the next so my chain of though stays intact...Supremelogic1 - Yes, short-term memory is such a part of doing any kind of math that even the slightest glitch in short-term memory can cause major difficulties. -
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/misunderstoodminds/math.html - http://www.rsna.org/rsna/media/pr2005/Coffee.cfm (For some users, not all users - coffee jump-starts short-term memory - coffee/caffeine is not a cure). The dyslexic race car driver, Jackie Stewart, cannot recite the alphabet through straight yet he is able to drive a car through a race circuit with skill. Time and again it is apparent some people cannot do some things yet can can do other things - sometimes at a very high level too. I tend to remember words/letters better than numbers. I also find it difficult to associate words and numbers together along the lines of numbers and names together on the back of football players uniforms. I am ADHD Inattentive with short-term memory challenges, not dyslexic myself. I can read ok. The right medicine (not a cure) for my ADHD Inattentive also helps me temporarily read with a little more continuity, sustained attention, and comprehension. - pgd

IMO for people with AS, poor short term memory probably has a lot to do with ADHD - hard to commit something to memory when the mind is flitting from one subject to the next in an unending chain of free-association.

I find different people mean different things by 'short term memory'.

Sometimes they use it to mean 'working memory'. Working memory is about holding in your brain the things you are dealing with at a particular moment - the information someone is giving you, for instance. I have difficulty with this, and it's much easier for me if the information is written down. I understand it's common to have working memory difficulties if you are on the autistic spectrum, because it's a kind of multitasking to hold various things in your brain simultaneously. Another example is doing mental arithmetic. I always find it easier to write it down because then I see the numbers and don't have to hold them all in my mind.

Some people use 'short term memory' to mean when things go into their memory for a few days - such as when they cram for exams - and then they don't remember them after the exams. This contrasts with 'long term memory', which is used to mean when something is learnt enough times to stay permanently in your memory. I have difficulty with these being two different concepts, because I often remember facts after only hearing them once, so the 'short term memory' thing doesn't seem to even happen - the facts go straight into the long term memory.

When my daughter had her evaluation her short term memory was a deficit. She scored 16th percentile which is quite drastic considering some of her other scores were 99th percentile.

It was explained to me as a verbal processing issue. When they would name off parts of the body, then showed her pictures of body parts and asked her to point to ones they named she couldn't do it. But when she touched her corresponding body parts when they named them she was able to pick them out. Strange. When she visually or in a tactile fashion associated the parts with the words as she heard them (converting the " verbal" word to a visual or tactile memory), she could remember but just the verbal "names" of the parts wasn't sufficient to create the memory.

This was explained as quite common in AS. I think converting verbal data to a visual "memory" is quite difficult until you becomes well adapted to associating words with pictures in your brain.

I was reading an article about short term memory problems, that cited the reason
for it being that most people are encouraging this problem by use of the computer.
For example, I find that when I am on the computer, I usually have several tabs open
at the same time, and flit from one thing to another. Of course a lot of us on the
spectrum are already challenged to stay focused, so this encourages the inability
to focus. If I can find the article, I'll post a link.

The article further suggested that one way to cope, was to not allow yourself to do
something else until you'd finished the task at hand. And to deliberately schedule
times of not focusing. For example, if I am paying my
bills online, I won't allow myself to look up something on Wiki until I am done. Better
still, I will schedule an hour for web surfing, with no particular focus. The rest of the
time, I must stay on task until it is complete. I have been trying this, and things are
improving.

I am also diagnosed with dyslexia due to short term memory problems. I think it is the most frustrating problem for an aspie to have. Information has always been so important to me and I can't remember any of it .

I was told by the psycolagist that diagnosed me that I was the most dyslexic person he had ever met and lucky to be able to read and write at all. I hadn't a clue about AS then so I guess my diagnosis may have been different if they had taken that into consideration.

I can't say for sure how it relates to ASD's, but my one official dx is "cognitive disorder NOS," which is primarily due to short-term memory impairment. And prior to that (about 20 years ago) it was pretty good, so the change was very noticeable.

Short-term memory is "scratch pad memory." I.e. when you add two 3-digit numbers in your head, you need to remember what the numbers are as you work with the individual digits. Also, when reading (or listening) you need to be able to remember what the previous sentence/paragraph/page was about in order to follow the thread of the book/article/whatever. At the worst time, by the time I'd finish the second half of a sentence I'd have forgotten the first half. It was like trying to understand a newspaper by reading the strips of it after it had been put through a shredder.

And there's typical ED stuff: loading the washer and the phone rings and completely forgetting about the wash after hanging up the phone 5 seconds later. Or going into the kitchen 6 times in a row and not returning with what you meant to get.

(There's a video by Anbuend about going into the kitchen and poking at random stuff, and plugging something in or opening cabinets just because that's what's in front of you at that moment -- I have totally done that. Things are a bit better these days, though. I think the video is called "How to boil water in 5 hours.)

And then there's things like where you parked your car at the store, or what you went to the store to get, or where you're driving to when you're halfway there.

I think the average person would be surprised at how debilitating short-term memory problems can be. It's something that get used a lot in everyday living. It can even get in the way of measures to compensate for it, like making notes, but forgetting where you put them, or forgetting what you wanted to write down by the time you pick up a pen.

It seems to be a sensitive function of the brain, in that a lot of things can cause it. I.e. mild head injury, the beginnings of MS and other neurological disorders, encephalitis or other brain infections, etc. Pretty much any insult to the brain can cause it. The latest thing is soldiers from Iraq being far enough from IED's not to be hurt physically, but close enough that the shock wave strains or breaks neural connections in their brain. (That's not what happened to me, BTW.) So they end up with diffuse brain damage (that doesn't show up as a "brain injury" on scans) which typically shows up as ST memory problems. And, not surprisingly, these guys/women are having trouble being taken seriously about their level of impairment..

And that's the other problem -- it doesn't "look" like anything. You're not walking like someone with MS or CP, no slurred speech, and you can spell your name, so it's assumed you must be neurologically fine.

I've been on a ridiculous number of meds to try to improve it, but nothing seems to touch the fundamental problem. Stimulants (for me) were slightly helpful. They'd narrow my focus, so I'd have fewer distracting thoughts, but the memory problem would still be significant.

There was a good book by a doctor who had really severe (but not the worst it can be) ST memory loss, called "Over my Head" (by Osborne). Also, I've found books about mild traumatic brain injuries helpful.

It's hard to put into words, but I've noticed over the years that my thought processes have shifted. It's more "form and feel" than intricate steps of logic, which is how it was previously. It seems like an adaptation, as things can go fuzzy in my mind, but I don't lose the thread as easily, since it's less dependent on a chain of independent pieces (for lack of a better way of putting it).


End of long-term memory dump.

In most of the evaluations I've had, sensory distraction (or something like that) was cited as a reason for my poor short term memory. I can see why that would be the case. I can't multitask at all; once I begin thinking of, for example, how uncomfortable a scratchy chair is, whatever I was considering beforehand is absolutely gone for good.

Apple_in_my_Eye wrote (in part)(above): ...I've been on a ridiculous number of meds to try to improve it, but nothing seems to touch the fundamental problem. Stimulants (for me) were slightly helpful. They'd narrow my focus, so I'd have fewer distracting thoughts, but the memory problem would still be significant... - Apple - You give a good overview of the topic of working memory/short term memory (my view). Thank you. It's quite real for lots of people including some of those with brain injuries from car accidents/war injuries-concussions, and so on. In my case (ADHD Inattentive) I do respond to coffee/caffeine compounds a little (not a cure) along the lines of: - http://www.rsna.org/rsna/media/pr2005/Coffee.cfm - I can literally sense a small, temporary extension of letter span and digit span using coffee/caffeine compounds (not a cure). For some reason, coffee/caffeine compounds (not a cure) for me work far better than Ritalin, Dexedrine, Adderall, and Adderall XR to address the working memory/short term memory challenge. In my case, the coffee - caffeine compounds directly catch a small part of the fundamental problem for about four hours or so, then the temporary improvement fades away as the caffeine exits my system. Subsequent doses of caffeine for me do not work/work well. In order for the caffeine to work, I have to maintain (the ideal of) a good, balanced, healthy daily diet (including protein and so on). Caffeine with a crummy diet/a poor diet doesn't do it for me. With a good diet, caffeine works a little (not a cure) for me. - pgd

Any attempts to analyze how severe my memory problems fall flat when the autopilot factor comes into play. Many times during a day I will be in my head, focused inward, while my body does things. It it looks like 'I' do something, and indeed I do, but it can be argued that I wasn't really there at the time, so no memory was formed.

Drives my wife nuts.

That said, I do hit walls of proof from time to time that I do not retain things very long. A good example: Working on an art project on computer, I thought of a way to streamline things. Would help a lot if I created a directory for each artwork source under a main directory for the project. Great idea!

So I go into my file manager to set things up following this inspiration...and the project directory is already there, sub-folders and all. Moreover, the date of creation is one week ago.

Stuns me every time.

dp

I have poor short-term AND long-term memory. I can't seem to remember stuff at all.

But then again I CAN recall certain incidents vividly if tied to music. I can remember going to the hospital when I was four and the song playing in the car at the time was Madonna's "Borderline". To this day if I hear that song I feel sick to my stomach.

I can also remember what exact songs were playing at other moments in my life. Very strange.