When was the last time you recalled a looming dentist appointment off the top of your head? Or memorized a phone number that wasn’t also the lyrics to an interminable commercial jingle? If the answer escapes you, it’s likely that you use notes apps, phone cameras, voice memos, and schedulers to outsource the documentation of your memories and commitments.

Psychologists call it cognitive offloading, and it’s been a real boon to the convenient, efficient, and effective cataloging of the ever-swelling amount of information we consume daily.

“Generally, this type of offloading does enhance our performance,” says Julia Soares, Ph.D, assistant professor of psychology at New Mexico State University.

But not without taking a cut. Recent research is providing greater insights into the effects of transferring cognitive function to external media, and there’s evidence they’re not all beneficial.

Is all of this snapping, recording, logging, and storing a net gain for us mentally, or are we handing over too much brainpower to the machines? Well, after recording expert interviews via Zoom, transcribing them with AI, and substantiating it all online, we have answers!

What Is cognitive offloading?

“Cognitive offloading is when we use external devices—sources other than our brain, really—to complete a cognitive task,” Soares says. She notes this can include something as mundane as counting on your fingers, but when we document information, “we’re relying on the prosthetic memory or source available to take some of the responsibility of remembering on our behalf.”

To some extent, this phenomenon has existed as long as cave drawings. But technology is rapidly replacing a lot of the thinking we’ve done since human inception, with different devices and programs shouldering (braining?) different shares of the load.

Of particular focus for researchers studying the effects of digital documentation are the areas of prospective memory, working memory, and factual recall. It may be helpful to think of them as the ghosts of cognition’s past, present, and future. (Unless you’re just going to copy and paste this information somewhere, in which case don’t worry about thinking of them at all.)

• Prospective memory regards information about a future point in time. For instance, remembering an upcoming concert or scheduled business meeting.
• Working memory functions like computer RAM, temporarily holding new and existing information for present use, as with taking notes or following directions.
• Factual recall concerns information you already know and must retrieve, as if from a human hard drive. You use this when playing trivia or remembering where to turn next while driving.

Cognitive offloading subcontracts much of these functions to technology, pinging us with reminders, converting spoken instructions to text, and storing huge, searchable volumes of data.

How does cognitive offloading affect your brain?

When you document, or offload, important information (like photographing where you parked, or adding a number to your phone), your brain’s traffic controller reroutes processing in two ways:

Flush the data. This part of the process signals your brain to jettison the offloaded information from short-term storage, recognizing that a duplicate copy safely exists elsewhere.

Reassign bandwidth. With the high-value information safely offloaded, your brain reallocates the newly freed-up cognitive capacity for additional data and/or functions.

At its best, cognitive offloading helps lighten your mental workload. By farming out data storage to technology, you alter brain function from resource-intensive information maintenance to an open, more flexible state, freeing up limited working memory for other business.

Benefits of cognitive offloading

The benefits of cognitive offloading are as vast and varied as they are obvious.

1. Conserves cognitive effort

The brain burns about as many calories as any single organ in the body, so its use comes at a premium. “We’re pretty miserly when it comes to our limited cognitive resources,” says Dr. Evan Risko, Ph.D, professor and chair of psychology at the University of Waterloo.

So, sloughing off tasks like attention and memorization to computing can free us from the interference of nonessential information. Just a few years ago, you may have memorized dozens of numbers that a smartphone’s address book now does the work of remembering.

“Maybe we know a handful of phone numbers, but now when I try to think of my emergency contact number, there isn’t as much interference,” Soares says. “I don’t have as many numbers coming to mind as if I had memorized 50 phone numbers the way I might have before.”

2. Ensures greater accuracy

The human brain is still the most powerful computer on Earth, but it’s as prone to hallucinations—known in human intelligence as confabulations—as any bot. The ones and zeroes of digital information processing and storage make offloaded information more reliable.

“If I can look up information online, so long as it’s accurate I’m going to be less error prone than if I’m relying on memory, which we know can become flawed, which can degrade with time, with interference, with other relevant information coming to mind,” Soares says.

3. Promotes higher-level understanding

If you’re not expending precious brain wattage on recording information, you should, in principle, be able to focus more on the information itself, cultivating a greater mastery of the subject matter. Risko uses the recording of our interview with him as a case in point.

“By offloading this to technology, you’ve saved those resources that you would have invested in parallel note taking, which should benefit your ability to understand what I’m saying and think about it intelligently and respond with follow-up questions,” he says.

Costs of cognitive offloading

Wherein we ruin your plans to meld with the Matrix.

1. Diminished working memory and recall

By documenting moments and facts with digital ease, your brain’s ability to encode and retain that information in long-term memory can become impaired over time. The phenomenon is referred to by cognitive psychologists as digital amnesia or the “Google effect.”

Researchers conducted a test of recall by tasking several groups of participants with reproducing a sequence of colored squares from memory. Those who offloaded more information—measured by the frequency with which they referred to the source sequence—performed better at the immediate task, but retained less information long term.

“The main theory we’re working on with how cognitive offloading impairs memory is called the study-effort hypothesis,” Soares says. “And the idea is that we don’t put as much effort towards studying information that we know is going to be externally available.”

She adds, “When you save little bits of information, like trivia facts on a computer, you’re less likely to remember it when you’re told it’s saved than when you’re told that it’s deleted.”

2. Impaired decision-making

Retrieving information from your brain strengthens memory pathways. When you devolve that recall to external devices, the brain can become conditioned to lean on these tools as an extension of itself.

On a long enough timeline, this dependence on computer-generated responses can inhibit your own judgment, making it harder to improvise when technology invariably fails.

The accuracy threshold for determining whether thought automation is a net benefit or a liability is around 70 percent. That means a computer can misinterpret three out of every 10 things you offload onto it and still be considered worthwhile. That’s good for a C-minus in elementary school.

3. Misprioritization of information

With the ability to more readily chronicle everything we do and see, the threshold for what constitutes a memory worth documenting drops considerably. This is why—or, maybe, because—people who offload important information suddenly show a massive improvement in remembering the minor, low-value details they didn’t store.

A surprise memory test of research participants revealed that, when high-value information was documented externally, the ability to recall it via the brain was reduced. Ironically, recollection of lower-value data that wasn’t deemed worthy of documentation—which, again, we’re supposed to be doing to free our brains up for bigger, better thinking—was preserved instead.

So, it turns out that, while it’s hoovering up our most important learnings and memories en masse, all this technology may actually be training our brains to remember the least important stuff. The result can be a kind of digital hoarding that becomes so overwhelming that the information may as well not have been stored at all.

So, what’s a healthy amount of documenting?

When deciding how much of what you learn, see, and experience to offload onto a drive, camera roll, or social media platform, it helps to understand the trade-offs: the short-term ease and accuracy of limitless peripheral storage vs. the capability and quickness of well-conditioned long-term memory. Not to mention the ever-growing gigabytes of discarded data.

“I think a lot of people suffer from over-documenting,” Soares says. “I still take photos, but I do try not to take so many that I don’t want to review them later on.”

Chances are, however, that we’ll become increasingly accustomed to treating technology like a second brain. And, one day, we may regard remembering what we did last Thursday the way we do multiplying 27 x 82. Sure, we could do it manually, but why would we?

The post How documenting everything changes your brain appeared first on Popular Science.

Sciatica afflicts millions of people each year—though not as many people as think they have it. A growing catchall term among the undiagnosed for all manner of back problems, sciatica is a specific lower-back nerve condition that requires specific action to address.

“Early detection matters,” John Gallucci Jr. MS, ATC, PT, DPT, the CEO of JAG Physical Therapy, tells Popular Science. “If you start feeling sciatica pain, do not wait to get it treated. Prolonging the pain will only make it worse.” 

So, anyone seeking sciatica stretches and exercises should be certain they’ve received the right diagnosis for what they’re suffering before embarking on a concerted effort to relieve it. Once they do, however, they’ll find that sciatica can be improved fairly simply.

We asked Dr. Gallucci about the physical therapy exercises for sciatica he recommends, and he bent over backwards—don’t worry, it’s forward movement that triggers sciatica—to help. Learn about each below along with the symptoms, provocations, and prevention methods of sciatica.

What is sciatica? 

Sciatica refers to pain or tingling caused by irritation of the sciatic nerve, which governs much of your lower body function. It’s the body’s largest nerve, running from several roots in the lower spine, through the glutes, then down the back of the thigh and into the lower leg and foot.

“When any portion of this nerve becomes compressed or inflamed, the result can be pain or altered sensation anywhere along its long pathway,” Gallucci says.

A common misconception among amateur orthopedists mischaracterizes any lower back pain as sciatica, but that label applies strictly to pain originating from the sciatic nerve. Notably, a condition called piriformis syndrome can mimic sciatica symptoms due to the proximity to the sciatic nerve of the piriformis muscles that connect the spine and femur. Sciatica and piriformis syndrome stem from different causes and call for different remedies.

6 signs of sciatica

Sciatic pain is characterized by a sharp, shooting sensation that radiates from the low back into the buttock and leg, typically following along a discernible line. Besides pain, there are several other indicators of sciatica to watch for, according to Dr. Gallucci.

• Numbness or tingling in the buttock, thigh, calf, and/or foot.
• Leg or foot weakness such as difficulty lifting the toes or pushing off when walking.
• Muscle spasms in the low back or glutes, often triggered by transitions like standing up from sitting or rolling in bed.
• Worsened symptoms after prolonged sitting or long car rides. Many patients report “burning” or a “deep ache” after 20 to 40 minutes of sitting.
• Pain that eases with gentle walking.

In the vast majority of cases, sciatica only affects one side of the body at a time. 

When to see a doctor

If you experience these more serious symptoms, seek immediate medical care:

• Leg weakness that causes stumbling
• Numbness in the groin or “saddle” area
• Change in bowel or bladder control

What causes or worsens sciatica?

The most common cause of sciatica is a herniated or bulging lumbar disc, something only an MRI or CT scan can confirm. There are a number of factors that can contribute to both.

• Age: Sciatica appears to peak among people in their forties.
• Prolonged sitting: especially when combined with poor posture or deep, couch-style seats.
• Job: Incidence of sciatica has shown to be higher for certain occupations, including machine operators, truck drivers and workers placed in awkward positions (see below).
• Lifting with poor mechanics. Failing to use proper form when picking up even moderately heavy objects can overload the lumbar spine both acutely and chronically.
• Smoking: Cigarette use causes blood vessels to constrict, reducing an already limited nutrient supply to spinal discs, which may degrade faster with prolonged smoking.
• Tight hip flexors or hamstrings, which increase lumbar stress.
• Weak core and glutes, which can increase nerve strain and decrease stabilization.

Sciatica is generally inflamed by movements involving repetitive lumbar spine flexion (think: crunching), twisting of the trunk, frequent elevation of arms above shoulder height, even coughing. Prolonged sitting while driving or working at a desk can exacerbate this by increasing load on the intervertebral discs in your lower back, which can further irritate a herniated disc.

One thing that doesn’t appear to have an impact on sciatica is gender; no greater predisposition has been shown among men or women, though men are two to three times likelier to experience sciatica owing to their greater incidence of physically demanding work.

Most cases of sciatica resolve in four to six weeks with no long-term complications, even absent medical treatment. More severe cases may be accompanied by a longer recovery time.

7 Stretches and Exercises to Help Relieve Sciatica

The answer to your back pain is likely some form of movement. This selection of glides, stretches and exercises recommended by Dr. Gallucci provides seated, standing and lying options to decompress the lumbar spine and reduce pressure on the sciatic nerve.

1. Sciatic nerve glide (or “flossing”)

So called because it’s not quite a stretch, rather this movement gently mobilizes the nerve—rather than lengthening the muscle—to decrease sensitivity and improve circulation.

• Sit upright on the edge of a chair with both feet flat on the floor.
• Slowly straighten your right knee while pulling your right toes upward.
• Return to the starting position by returning your right foot to the floor while simultaneously bringing your chin toward your chest.
• Repeat by straightening your knee and bringing your head back up to neutral.

Reps: 10 to 15 per leg, 1 to 2 times per day

Tip: This movement should feel smooth, so avoid any sharp pulling.

2. Figure-4 piriformis stretch

This more conventional seated stretch reduces tension in the piriformis, a common compression point.

• Sit upright on the edge of a chair with both feet flat on the floor.
• Cross the ankle of your right leg over your left thigh, just above your knee. 
• Keeping your spine straight, gently lean forward until you feel a stretch and hold for 20 to 30 seconds.

Reps: Perform 2 to 3 rounds per leg.

Tip: Pull your knee toward the opposite shoulder for a deeper stretch.

3. Cat-cow spinal mobility

This classic yoga sequence improves spinal mobility and decreases stiffness around irritated segments.

• Get down on the floor in tabletop position, with your hands directly under your shoulders and your knees directly under your hips.
• Round your spine up toward the ceiling while simultaneously tucking your chin toward your chest and drawing your belly button inward.
• Reverse the move, slowly arching your back, while lifting your chest and tailbone upward, allowing your abdomen to relax.

Reps: Perform 10 to 15 cat-cows in a slow and controlled manner.

Tip: Focus on smooth lumbar movement rather than forcing large ranges of motion.

4. Child’s pose

Another yoga-inspired stretch that gently lengthens the spine and reduces lower-back pressure.

• Get down on the floor in tabletop position, with your hands directly under your shoulders and your knees directly under your hips.
• Sit your hips back toward your heels, and extend your arms forward on the floor. 
• Allow your forehead to rest on the floor and hold for 30 to 45 seconds

Tip: If your knees bother you, widen them or rest on a pillow.

5. Standing hamstring stretch

The lone standing movement on the list helps loosen hamstrings and relieve stress on your lumbar spine.

• Stand tall with your feet hip-width apart.
• Plant your right heel on the floor slightly in front of you with your knee straight and your toes pointing upward.
• Keeping your back flat, gently hinge forward at your hips until you feel a stretch in the back of your thigh.
• Hold for 20 to 30 seconds and repeat on the other leg.

Tip: Lengthen through your spine, hinging at your hips rather than rounding your back.

6. Glute bridge

This lying hip extension exercise strengthens glutes and the posterior chain, reducing load on your lumbar spine.

• Lie on your back with your arms at your sides and your feet flat on the floor.
• Engaging your core, drive through your heels and lift your hips toward the ceiling until your body forms a straight line from your knees to your shoulders.
• Slowly lower your hips back to the floor.

Reps: Perform 12 to 15 bridges per set, completing 2 to 3 sets.

Tip: Avoid arching your lower back.

7. Side-lying clamshell

Reduce load on your lumbar spine by strengthening your hip abductors, piriformis muscles, and glutes with this abduction exercise.

• Lie on your right side with your hips stacked and your knees bent 90 degrees. Rest your head on your right arm if it feels comfortable.
• Draw your knees in toward your body until your feet are in line with your glutes.
• Without allowing your hips to rotate, raise your top knee as far as you can and return it to the starting position.

Reps: Perform 20 to 30 clamshells per set, completing 2 to 3 sets per side.

Finally, it’s important to note that this article is intended for informational purposes only and does not constitute medical advice. You should always consult a healthcare professional before beginning a new exercise or treatment regimen.

The post 7 sciatica stretches and exercises for pain relief appeared first on Popular Science.