Our brain not only easily takes on the task of guiding this journey, it also does so without “bothering” us – we remain “unconscious” or at least rarely attend to the adjustments we are making regarding our adjustment of the steering wheel, accelerator or breaks. It is only when we are first learning to drive that we pay attention to these details – and we all know what an anxiety-filled experience this was the first time that we “took the wheel.”
Fortunately, we don’t have to attend to these details very often – and we are likely to remain an inexperienced and not very skillful driver if we continue to do this focusing. At best, we are attending to the other cars on the road, the speed limit and the weather – so that we can adjust our driving habits to accommodate (see here is this word being used) to the changing conditions associated with our journey.
The neural system involved in the engagement of these habitual processes is called Procedural Memory. It operates out of three areas of the brain: the cerebellum, parietal cortex and prefrontal cortex. All three of these areas are engaged early in learning motor skills. The cerebellum is especially important, as it is needed to coordinate the flow of movements required for skilled motion and timing of movements.
It is not easy to move and perform every-day tasks. Even though we may be only marginally conscious of our habitual behavior, many neural functions have to engaged and brought together for us to be skillful in the actions we take. The procedural memory plays a particularly important role as we grow older. While other areas of our brain may deteriorate as we age, the procedural memory system tends to remain intact. We might not be able to teach an old dog new tricks, but we can usually be assured that the old dog still can do the old tricks.
There is a second memory system that is engaged when we are trying to remember something, when we are sorting through existing information, when we are retrieving old memories to assist us with problem-solving or decision-making. This is called the Declarative Memory system. Much of what Piaget was describing in terms of the dynamic interplay between assimilation and accommodation relates directly to this second memory system. Procedural memory is almost purely assimilative—the habits pretty much run the show unless something important is happening in our environment and attention must be paid to the changes that are occurring (meaning that we are turning on our Declarative memory).
