A new memory needs more than a moment of attention
When you hear a name, your brain has to do more than register its sound. It must connect that sound to the person and keep the link available long enough to use it. Attention helps select and organize those details; without it, the name may never become a stable memory in the first place.
For a few seconds, information can be held in working memory—the mental workspace used to keep something in mind while you act on it. This workspace is limited. Turning to a text brings new words, choices, and goals into the same workspace, competing with the name you were trying to retain.
Why the switch is so disruptive
A distraction does not necessarily delete a fully formed memory. Often, the trouble is that the memory was still being assembled. The new task pulls attention away from the details that would help preserve it, and the name becomes harder to retrieve. Even if it remains somewhere in memory, you may lose the immediate cue or train of thought that would have brought it back.
That is why the interruption can feel like a sudden blank rather than gradual forgetting. The moment you turn back, you are trying to resume a mental task whose pieces were briefly held together by attention. Saying the name aloud, repeating it, or linking it to a face gives it another route to find later; checking the text first may leave you with no such foothold.
