8 How have computers changed the way we think?

A research paper has identified three new realities about how we process information in the Internet age. First, when we don't know the answer to a question, we now think about where we can find the nearest Web connection instead of the subject of the question itself. For example, the query "Are there any countries with only one color in their flag?" prompted study participants to think not about flags but about computers. A second revelation: when we expect to be able to find information again later on, we don't remember it as well as when we think it might become unavailable. The researcher’s final observation: the expectation that we'll be able to locate information down the line leads us to form a memory not of the fact itself but of where we'll be able to find it. We are learning what the computer 'knows' and when we should attend to where we have stored information in our computer-based memories.We are becoming symbiotic with our computer tools. this new symbiosis with our digital devices is really just a variant of a much more familiar phenomenon, which psychologists call transactive memory. This is the unspoken arrangement by which groups of people dole out memory  tasks to each individual, with information to be shared when needed. In a marriage, one spouse might remember the kids' after-school appointments while the other keeps track of the recycling-pick up schedule.