Why do we never lose certain skills we have learned, even if we haven’t practiced them for a long time. like for example riding a bicycle, and we lose some, like a new language we learned 10 years ago but can’t remember anything about it now?

Question

Why do we never lose certain skills we have learned, even if we haven’t practiced them for a long time. like for example riding a bicycle, and we lose some, like a new language we learned 10 years ago but can’t remember anything about it now?

In: 5857

Answer 1

Well first off you can’t completely lose a skill. If you speak another language don’t use it for years and then go somewhere where that’s the primary language you’ll eventually pick it back up and you’ll do so faster the second time cause somethings will come back as soon as you jog your memory.

Now why are somethings easier to relearn than others? There’s 2 main reasons.

1. Simplicity. Peddling a bike is A LOT easier than having a conversation in Mandarin (assuming that you haven’t spoken any mandarin in a few years)

2. Muscle memory. Just like your brain can go on autopilot and do a task with some level of success your brain can largely forget how to do something but your muscles remember. A great example of this is swimming. As a kid I went swimming every day in the summer and spring now I don’t swim at all but if I were to jump into that pool right now my arms and legs would be able to tread water and do all kinds of different strokes as if no time had passed at all