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Your phone became your memory. Here is what it cost.

The research on cognitive offloading is not subtle. When we expect a device to remember for us, we remember less — and reach for the device sooner next time.

There is a specific, measurable thing that happens to a mind that knows it can always look something up.

In 2011, a team at Columbia ran a now-famous set of experiments. People typed facts into a computer. Half were told the file would be saved; half were told it would be erased. Everyone was then asked to recall the facts from memory. The group that believed the computer had saved the information remembered noticeably less of it. They had, without deciding to, delegated the remembering.11. Sparrow, B., Liu, J., & Wegner, D. M. (2011). Google effects on memory. Science, 333(6043), 776–778.

The researchers called the machine a piece of transactive memory — an external partner you offload to, the way couples split who-remembers-what over decades. The internet, they argued, had quietly become everyone’s transactive partner at once. We no longer remember the fact. We remember the path to the fact.

That sounds harmless until you notice the second finding. In later work, people who had just used a search engine were more likely to reach for it again on the next question — including easy ones they could have answered themselves. A meaningful share never even tried to recall first.22. Storm, B. C., Stone, S. M., & Benjamin, A. S. (2016). Using the internet to access information inflates future use of the internet. Memory. Offloading is not a one-time convenience. It is a habit that compounds. Each time you outsource the retrieval, the next retrieval feels a little more out of reach, so you outsource that one too.

Now layer generative AI on top. A chatbot does not just store the fact for you; it does the thinking for you — frames the question, weighs the options, writes the conclusion. Early evidence is that heavier reliance tracks with weaker independent reasoning, and that the more people trust the tool, the less critical thinking they bring to the task.33. Lee, H.-P. et al. (2025). The impact of generative AI on critical thinking. CHI 2025; Gerlich, M. (2025). Societies, 15(1), 6. The convenience is real. So is the bill.

None of this is an argument against tools. It is an argument about which tool. A tool can be built to absorb the effort, or it can be built to give the effort back to you at the moment it pays. Almost everything shipping right now does the first. Soma is a deliberate bet on the second.

Sources

  1. Sparrow, B., Liu, J., & Wegner, D. M. (2011). Google effects on memory. Science, 333(6043), 776–778.

  2. Storm, B. C., Stone, S. M., & Benjamin, A. S. (2016). Using the internet to access information inflates future use of the internet. Memory.

  3. Lee, H.-P. et al. (2025). The impact of generative AI on critical thinking. CHI 2025; Gerlich, M. (2025). Societies, 15(1), 6.