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Have you ever had the experience of attending a training course with the opinion that you are still up to speed on technique, only to find out that you had forgotten quite a bit, or what you had been doing is different to what you were initially taught? In short, what you had initially been taught has become distorted over time.
Have you ever had the experience of teaching someone something only to find them doing something different a short while later, convinced that what they are doing is what you had shown them?
Have you ever had someone show you a technique that they are convinced you taught them, but you know for a fact you didn't?
This is very possibly down to a process known as reconsolidation.
The Mechanics of Memory
When our brains record an experience it is captured by the firing of a particular arrangement of neurons (nerve cells) which leave them connected and primed to fire again to re-create that 'just happened' moment and this short term memory trace lasts just a few seconds.
To be turned into something more permanent, the synapses that connect the arrangement of neurons that equal the memory, swell with more receptors and neurotransmitters and after a few hours the brain cells themselves actually grow, sprouting new and thicker connections to make the memory trace more permanent.
This is a very simplified account of something termed consolidation.
During consolidation the building of this brain pattern occurs deep in the brain in places like the hippocampus, but over the course of weeks and even years it moves to more general areas of the cortex - a bit like moving something from your ram to your hard-drive.
However, although it appears that memory moves from the hippocampus to the cortex during consolidation, it is returned to the hippocampus for reconsolidation by the act of memory recall, and this act of reconsolidation makes the memory 'plastic'.
If a memory becomes plastic every time it is recalled then it is vulnerable to change. What this means is that the memory can be updated and re-filed in a different way to when it was initially stored (consolidated) and this can be a powerful and empowering aspect in our personal development if used correctly, for example, to challenge out-dated beliefs that hold us back. Let me give you an example.
For many centuries people had thought it impossible to run a four-minute mile. Some of the finest medical people of those ages even promoted the belief that it was impossible to do so and some notable scientists even suggested that the human body would explode if made to go that fast! Then, on the 6th May 1954 Roger Bannister did what they all thought was impossible - he ran a mile in under four minutes.
However, what was amazing was that within one year of him doing so, another three hundred runners ran a mile in under 4 minutes!!
In essence it only took one counter-example for everyone else to change a limiting belief - even one promoted by so called 'professionals'.
The Training Connection
In brief, the reconsolidation theory suggests that when memories are recalled they become vulnerable to change.
Trainers and coaches should be aware therefore that every time an individual thinks about a technique, the very thought - the memory of the skill - becomes unstable and vulnerable to change. That change can be in one of several forms:
· The memory could be strengthened in its meaning - it becomes more of what it was.
· It can be weakened - it has less effect on the belief network it's connected to.
· It can be transformed by having the meaning of it reframed - and by doing so transform the belief that derives from it
· It could be deleted altogether.
The first possibility could be why all the recent studies of counselling styles that rely on going over past events and talking about the feelings relating to them, tend to deepen an individual's experience of the problem.
"What you focus on you get more of"
In the same way, this can be why some training courses simply re-enforce bad practice, particularly if attention is constantly focused on what a person shouldn't be doing as opposed to what they should be doing.
However, a competent trainer or coach would use the first possibility to re-enforce good practice only and structure their language patterns to frame instruction in the positive, thereby moving a delegates focus of attention away from what they are possibly doing wrong to what they are doing right and build from there.
The second and third possibilities allows trainers to find new and progressive ways of improving a person's technique or skill level by changing the belief system that it is attached to. For example, we recently had someone on one of our courses who believed that the use of a more restrictive technique on a child was wrong and could find no reason in any context when a more restrictive technique could be used. As a result he had good natural ability in the less-restrictive (non-harmful) technical areas of training, but when practicing more restrictive techniques his belief was so strong that it affected his ability to the extent that he couldn't physically do the skill.
What we did was to relate case-study scenarios and real-life experiences, combined with actual facts of law and coaching research to show how, in some circumstances, a more restrictive technique could reduce risk and in doing so had to be in the best interest of the child. This allowed him to challenge his own belief about such techniques, which resulted in him changing his thinking for the better. This in turn made his ability naturally more effective when practicing the skills that he previously couldn't do.
If we assume the memories are the source of our behaviour - then changing those specific memories or the beliefs and meaning associated with them, we must also change the meaning of every other memory connected to them, resulting in a change in a person's behaviour.
By understanding the mechanics of memory and the principles of consolidation and reconsolidation, and the fact that when a memory is recalled it becomes 'plastic' and therefore vulnerable to change, we now have new tools in our armoury as trainers and coaches that can help us assist individuals even further than before in helping them produce positive changes in their lives, and by achieving positive change allowing them to only focus on that which they need to focus on to make those changes a reality. By doing this we can help those people who come to us for training achieve things that they may have previously thought outside of their capabilities.
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