What is muscle memory?

Please further explain what is muscle memory.

Hi Mariah,

The science of muscle memory explains that automatic skills develop within a specific brain system responsible for procedural memory.

Best Regards,
Aidan Bernales
Community Moderator at Typesy

Hi, @mariahacosta!

You know the saying, “it’s like riding a bike,” referring to an inherent ability to do something despite not having done it in a long time? That’s muscle memory! When you learn to ride a bike, your brain memorizes how your body moves during the action. Even if you haven’t biked in years, you’ll likely have no problem balancing just fine if you were to hop on one today. Your brain commits repeat physical movements to muscle memory, just as it would store a thought memory.

For touch typing, this means that the muscle memory developed during the learning process will strengthen to the point that you’ll be able to move your fingers across the keys without looking or without even thinking much about what you’re doing at all. It also means that once you’ve mastered touch typing, you’ll likely hold on to the skill for life!

Regards,
Alex (The Reimagined Classroom Teacher)