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If you learned to ride a bike as a kid, at some point you probably left the bike in the garage for months or years before coming back to it.
如果你小时候学会骑自行车，在某个时候你可能会把车放在车库里几个月或几年，然后再接着骑。
And though you might have been a little wobbly when you finally decided to climb back on, you never had to go through that training wheel phase that you did at the start.
虽然当你最终决定骑上它时，可能会有点摇晃，但你不用再经历一次从头开始学的训练阶段。
The feeling is so familiar, it’s become a figure of speech.
这种感觉太熟悉了，都变成了一种修辞手法。
When something's easy to remember after a long time not doing it, you say it's "like riding a bike."
当你好久不做一件事，但非常容易就能记起来时，你会说“就像骑自行车一样”。
But this kind of memory really does stand apart from other kinds.
但这种记忆确实与其他记忆不同。
Even when people suffer memory loss, memories of how to do things often survive.
即使当人们失去记忆时，对如何做事情的记忆却常常存在。
So why is riding a bike, just like riding a bike?
为什么是骑自行车，就像骑自行车一样呢？
Motor memories get stored differently than lots of other memories, making them harder to lose — but like other memories, there’s still a lot we don’t know.
运动记忆的储存方式不同于其他记忆，这使得它们更难丢失。但和其他记忆一样，我们仍然有很多不了解的东西。
Motor memory is the ability to repeat motions and remember motor skills.
运动记忆是一种重复动作和记忆运动技能的能力。
It’s part of a category of memories called implicit memories, which are generally things you learn less by thinking and more by doing.
它是一种被称为内隐记忆的记忆的一部分，一般来说，学习内隐记忆时，思考较少，而行动较多。
And when you learn things without putting in specific effort to learn them, weird things can happen.
当你在学习过程中没有付出特别的努力去学的时候，怪异的事情就会发生。
Like, back in the 80s, 48 students were asked to identify what was in some incomplete photos.
比如，在80年代，48名学生被要求辨认一些不完整照片中的内容。
Some they had just seen the full version of, but others were completely new to them.
有些人刚看过完整版的照片，但对于其他人来说这些照片却是全新的。
But then, 17 years later, researchers got in touch with 12 of them, brought them back, and compared them to a control group who had never seen any of the pictures before.
但是，17年后，研究人员联系了其中的12个人，把他们叫回来，并把他们与一个从未见过这些照片的对照组进行比较。
Those 12 still did better at identifying partial photos when they hadn’t seen the full version in 17 years.
这12人在17年没有看到完整版照片的情况下，仍然能更好地识别出部分照片。
While the control group didn't show any difference.
而对照组没有表现出任何差异。
4 of those 12 also said they had no memory of even being in the study, which is part of what makes it implicit.
其中4人还说，他们甚至没有记忆自己参加过研究，这也是使研究呈现出内隐性的一部分。
No one ever sat them down to make them study up on photos because they were going to be tested later, like you might for a test in school.
从没有人让他们坐下来，让他们花时间来研究这些照片，原因是他们今后将像在学校参加考试一样接受测试。
Those implicit memories also use different brain systems than other kinds.
这些内隐记忆也使用不同于其他类型记忆的大脑系统。
One of the first on any list of brain parts related to memory is probably the hippocampus, which is involved in making new memories.
在所有与记忆相关的大脑部位名单中，最早出现的可能是海马体，它参与产生新的记忆。
But it’s less important for implicit and motor memories.
但对于内隐记忆和运动记忆来说，这并不重要。
One reason we know this is from studying patients with amnesia.
我们知道这点的一个原因是对健忘症患者的研究。
When people suffer injuries to the hippocampus and nearby parts of the temporal lobe, they tend to lose memories from before the injury, and also can't make new memories afterward.
当人们的海马体和颞叶附近部位受到损伤时，他们往往会失去受损之前的记忆，也无法在损伤后形成新记忆。
These are called retrograde and anterograde amnesia, respectively.
这些分别称为逆行性遗忘和顺行性遗忘。
And while it would be, of course, massively unethical to cause brain damage in order to study memory, case studies of people who have suffered brain injuries can give us unique insight.
当然，为了研究记忆而造成脑损伤是极不道德的行为，但对脑损伤患者的个案研究可以给我们独特的见解。
Basically, if someone damages part of their brain and loses a certain function, you know that part was necessary for that function.
基本上，如果有人的大脑因部分受损而失去某种功能，就能知道它是执行该功能所必需的部分。
And some of these cases have interesting twists.
其中一些个案的故事很有趣。
For example, one patient spent years volunteering to shelve books at his library after a motorcycle accident caused him to lose his hippocampus, preventing him from making new memories.
例如，一名患者在摩托车事故中导致他失去了能产生新记忆的海马体后，花费了多年时间志愿在图书馆搁置书籍。
But he still learned the Dewey Decimal System — even though he couldn't tell you how he learned it.
但是，他还是学会了杜威十进制，尽管他无法说出他是怎么学会的。
Which means that researchers have to look beyond the hippocampus to understand how implicit memories work.
这意味着研究人员必须从海马体以外的区域去了解内隐记忆的工作方式。
And for motor memories in particular, we've got a few leads.
特别是对于运动记忆，我们有一些线索。
One of these regions is the cerebellum.
其中一个区域是小脑。
That's a part of your brain that's separate from the cerebral cortex.
那是大脑中与大脑皮层相分离的一部分。
Other brain regions involved in memory, like the hippocampus, are part of the cerebral cortex, so the fact that it's separate might be part of why this learning can be unconscious.
其他与记忆有关的大脑区域，如海马体，是大脑皮层的一部分，所以它是分开的。这可能是为什么这种学习会是无意识的一部分。
And one of its major purposes seems to be fine-tuning of motion.
它的主要目的之一似乎是对运动进行微调。
That includes careful movements like balancing on a bike or playing the piano.
这包括细致的动作，比如在自行车上保持平衡或者弹钢琴。
It's a complicated system, but some of the tools that make it all work are called Purkinje cells.
这是一个复杂的系统，但是一些使它正常工作的工具叫做浦肯野细胞。
They collect signals from neurons coming from other sensory systems, like sight and sound, and convert them into a signal that fires at a variable frequency, up to 500 spikes per second.
它们从其他感觉系统（如视觉和声音）的神经元中收集信号，并将其转换成一种频率可变的信号，最高可达每秒500次峰值。
That signal gets sent to different motor systems, like hand grasping or gait, hopefully adding up to a smooth, fluid motion.
这个信号被发送到不同的运动系统，如手抓或步态，希望叠加起来是一个平稳、流畅的运动。
One of the mysteries, though, is that this might not be where these memories are stored.
不过，其中一个谜团是，这些记忆可能不是储存在这里的。
Instead, research has pointed to changes in a number of different brain regions — not all of which are where we’d expect.
相反，研究指出了一些不同大脑区域的变化，并非所有都是我们预期看到的。
For example, in a study published in Nature in 2004, 24 people were split into two groups, one of which was asked to learn to juggle.
例如，在2004年发表在《自然》期刊上的一项研究中，24人被分为两组，其中一组被要求学会玩杂耍。
After about 3 months of practice, they could juggle for a solid 60 seconds.
经过大约3个月的练习，他们可以连续玩60秒。
The researchers scanned their brains and found changes in the temporal lobe and the intraparietal sulcus in the group who learned to juggle.
研究人员扫描了他们的大脑，发现学习杂耍的那组人，颞叶和顶叶内沟发生了变化。
These weren’t regions associated with memory per se — instead they had to do with tracking visual motion and planning hand movements.
这些区域本身并不与记忆相关，而是与跟踪视觉运动和规划手部运动有关。
But then, 3 months after that, the volunteers got their brains scanned again, and those changes were still there, though they were a little smaller.
但3个月后，志愿者们再次接受了脑部扫描，这些变化仍然存在，尽管它们的体积稍小一些。
That’s even though none of them reported continuing to practice.
虽然没有人报告说，他们还在继续练习。
I guess once scientists tell you are done, you just stop juggling.
我想一旦科学家告诉你试验做完了，你就不会再玩杂耍了。
Come on!
快点！
Have some fun!
玩得开心点！
But similar studies found other brain locations were important — so we probably won’t ever tie motor memories to just a single location or process.
但是类似的研究发现，其他的大脑位置很重要，所以我们可能永远不会把运动记忆仅和一个部位或过程联系起来。
And those neurons in the cerebellum might not be just for motor skills.
小脑中的这些神经元可能不仅是为了运动技能。
There’s evidence some cognitive tasks require them as well.
有证据表明，一些认知任务也需要它们参与。
Some research has even tied them to emotional experiences.
一些研究甚至把它们与情感体验联系起来。
So the next time you get back on your bicycle, give some thanks at least in part to your cerebellum!
所以，下次你再骑自行车时，至少要部分感谢你的小脑！
It’s one of the major things keeping you balanced and upright — and contributing to your ability to hold on to that for years.
它是让你保持平衡和直立的一个重要因素，并且有助于你保持多年不忘。
Thanks for watching this episode of SciShow Psych.
感谢收看本期《心理学科学秀》节目。
We couldn’t make SciShow without the help of our patrons.
如果没有赞助人的帮助，我们就无法制作出这个节目。
Patrons get access to neat perks, not least of which is the satisfaction of helping to bring free educational content to the whole entire internet.
用户可以享受到许多额外的好处，其中最重要的是通过帮助将免费的教育内容在整个互联网中传播而收获到的满足感。
If that sounds like your jam, head over to patreon.com/scishow and sign up.
如果这听起来让你很感兴趣，那就去patreon.com/scishow注册吧。
