7. Our Attention is Limited; Our Memory is Imperfect

Long-term memory

visual, auditory, olfactory, gustatory, or tactile sensory trigger responses starting in areas of the brain dedicated to each sense, then spread into other areas of the brain that are not specific to any particular sensory modality. The set of neurons that are activated after the initial register, depends on the perception. The context and the features. (Car noises on the street on the way to work and a new song that you heard for the first time at a bar alone has different context, and registered differently)

Activating a memory consists of reactivating the same pattern of neural activity that occurred when the memory was formed. The more often a neural memory pattern is reactivated, the stronger it becomes, easier to recall and recognize.

Semantic: Long-term memory stores facts and relationships. 5+5=10, DC is the capital of the states, and Earth is not flat.

Episodic: Lont-term memory records past events. I had a surgery 10 days ago.

Procedural: Long-term memory remembers action sequences. How to tie shoes, neckties, and doing yoga pose in the order.

New memory steals neurons from old memory. A new experience is never totally new; it shares features that encode those older experiences. Over time, a new memory is strengthened by repeated experience or practice, while related older memories lose details. (You haven't saw a person for a while, the facial details, sound of their voice, small details of their actions will be encoded with other people's that you met recently more frequently.)

Short-term memory

Our perceptual senses has its own very brief short-term "memory" resulting from residual neural activity after a perceptual stimulus ceases. 

Working memory is combined focus of our attention. Everything that the person is conscious of at the time. 

When a new "sense" is registered, it leaves short-term memory, the working memory is when we are focusing on the sense and the neuron patterns that are being registered and/or reactivate similar neurons, which is long-term memory. Some people could focus on multiple things at a same time while some couldn't. Some people could focus on a long time while some couldn't.

Working memory

People usually can hold 4~6 items in their working memory. (reduces CTAs, the burden of relying on people's attention)

Besides of what a person is focused on, these can draw their attention;

• Movement, especially movement near or closing
• Threats
• Faces of other people
• Sex and food

Make or suggest a "chunk" to activate / boost working memory. (it's easier to remember a whole sentence rather than remembering random words. 3141592 and 3.141592 (pi) which one is easier to remember?)

Voice User Interface (VUI)

As it's heavily relying on the users' working memory, more than 5 voice commands options can't be remembered.

Modes

• A car, gas pedal becomes moving back instead of moving forward when you change the car mode from Drive to Rear.
• A camera, shutter button becomes taking a video when the mode is changed to video mode. 

Modes can provide more features and reducing more buttons or actions that user needs to remember. However, it should give enough feedback what mode that the user is in and the changed feature is.