​What's on your mind but you can't remember it? Sorry, I'm "TOT"

You are chatting with your friends and suddenly you think of something interesting to say, but when the words come to your lips, you suddenly forget what you were going to say...

You have an important matter to apply to your boss, and your mind goes blank the moment you see your boss...

When the teacher asks a question in class, you raise your hand confidently, but the moment you stand up, you suddenly forget what you were going to say...

If you have similar symptoms to the above, don’t doubt whether you have any serious illness. These are all caused by the tip of the tongue phenomenon (TOT).

01

What is tip of tongue phenomenon?

In 1890, American psychologist William James first proposed the TOT effect in his book Principles of Psychology.

Later, many psychology researchers also tried to explain this phenomenon. For example, Freud tried to explain this problem by the conflict between subconscious desires and impulses. With the development of brain science research, people have further understood the tip of the tongue effect.

From the perspective of brain science, the human brain is actually like a computer. When faced with new information, the brain will compile it into its own language and then store it in memory. When needed, we retrieve it in the brain and then interpret the compiled language. Any error in any step will lead to the TOT phenomenon.

The tip of the tongue effect occurs when we do not understand new information well enough to store it in our minds; when we do not review it regularly and become unfamiliar with the new information; when we do not have a sound retrieval system; and when we do not translate the words in our brains into spoken language.

02

What is the tip of the tongue effect related to?

The first is the age factor . Studies have shown that after adulthood, the older you are, the more frequent the TOT phenomenon occurs.

As we age, memory storage function declines, making some originally clear definitions blurred. In addition, older people tend to overactivate their prefrontal cortex when TOT occurs, which leads to repeated retrieval when memory retrieval fails, falling into the closed loop of TOT. Because of this, older people are more likely to be anxious when they encounter TOT.

Secondly, emotions can also affect the occurrence of TOT phenomenon. The more you think about it, the harder it is to remember it. When you stop thinking about it, you suddenly remember it. Because emotional predictions are generated before memory is generated, emotions such as anxiety or tension will affect memory function and aggravate the tip of the tongue effect.

When the teacher calls on you to answer a question, your mind goes blank. When someone is watching you do your homework, you tend to make mistakes. These are all examples of mistakes made under the influence of emotions. In addition, the tip of the tongue effect can in turn have a negative impact on emotions, which can create a vicious cycle.

The amazing thing is that bilingual learning can sometimes cause the tip of the tongue effect. If you are used to speaking Chinese, and suddenly you are asked to praise someone in English by saying "awesome", will you only be able to think of "beautiful" for a moment?

03

How to overcome TOT?

So, how can we overcome the tip of the tongue effect? ​​Here are a few tips.

First of all, it is very important to form your own knowledge network. This greatly improves your efficiency in retrieving information, so that you can find the knowledge accurately and effectively when you need it. Whether in study or work, building a mind map is a good way to get familiar with and understand your own way of thinking and thinking patterns, and understand yourself better, and TOT will slowly stay away from you!

For example, if you want to compliment a girl on her beauty but forget how to do it, what should you do? You can accumulate a set of complimenting rules. Facial features, temperament, jewelry, and figure are all things that can be complimented. This way, next time you meet a beautiful girl, you will not just say "you are so beautiful"!

Secondly, you need to keep a calm mind. As long as I am not embarrassed, it is others who are embarrassed. Only when you are calm can you come up with more and better ways to defeat the enemy. If you suddenly can't remember, take a deep breath, trust your brain, and let the bullets fly for a while. When you are complimenting a girl, if your brain suddenly gets stuck, it is better to be silent and think for a while, and you will always achieve unexpected results.

Finally, divert your attention . If you really can't remember it, just put it aside. Just like many things that don't appear when we try hard to find them, they appear again when we don't bother to find them - you can find them without any effort after searching everywhere.

Of course, TOT is not a disease. This effect may occur in anyone, regardless of gender, age, or educational level. Occasionally saying "that...that" is normal behavior, but if TOT occurs frequently, it should be taken seriously. It may be a precursor to illness and you need to contact a psychologist for diagnosis in time.

In the future, if we encounter the situation of "brain freeze" or "I forgot how to say it, anyway, it's that", we don't need to be embarrassed anymore - take a deep breath and tell the other person, sorry, I'm TOT.

END

Reviewer: Yuan Bo, Institute of Neuroscience, Chinese Academy of Sciences

Tadpole Musical Notation original article, please indicate the source when reprinting

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