No body’s memory is infallible. Yet, there is a marked difference across individuals with respect to the quantity and quality of successful retrieval. It is but natural that people have different types of interests and aptitudes. Accordingly they display a very high rate of success in some areas whereas they fail miserably in other sectors. A botanist is likely to remember the names and details of a large number of plants. It would be almost impossible for a layman.
Despite such factors of life interest shaping our memory, there is also an interesting element of commonality. When we receive information from the external world, there is a channel capacity for a human being. The stimulus, be it visual or auditory, impinges on our eyes and/or ears and produces a sensory impression. But this sensory impression is very fragile. It fades away. The individual tries to process some amount of information, but it has a limit.
It has been observed that seven items constitute the limit. A popular expression used by psychologists denotes: Magic number 7 2. It implies that people in general can remember only seven items following a short and brief single-item exposure. If somebody tells us a telephone number by uttering each digit once in a sequential manner, we can remember seven digits that constitute the whole or part of a telephone number. Of course, there is a variation. The capacity ranges from five to nine, with seven as the average success.
There are two fundamental implications derived from this proposition. First, this channel capacity of seven items (such as seven digits in a telephone number) constitutes our short-term memory. We see or hear something, and receive them; neural processing and retrieval is limited to seven. Suppose we see a telephone number of a doctor from the directory, try to remember it, use it subsequently by recalling the information, and then the matter is over. The whole business is that of the short term storage.
If we intend to keep it longer for future use, we adopt a process of rehearsal, we repeat the items silently or sub-vocally or vocally. The materials now have a chance to pass from the short-term storage to long-term storage. In sum, rehearsal is essential to transfer the short-term memory to long-term memory.
Second, the question arises as to whether it is possible to remember more than seven items through the use of some techniques. The answer is ‘yes’. It is possible to remember more than seven digits of a telephone number using the mechanism of chunking. Chunking means grouping. When each digit is a discrete one, each one constitutes an item. If several digits could be grouped, a large number of digits can be converted into a small number of items. Suppose, somebody’s telephone number is 444 666 555 333. Although it has twelve digits the person can very easily group these into four items, each item consisting of three same digits. Let us examine another illustration. Sombody’s telephone number is 19471950365. For all practical purpose, the person would visualize it as three items: the first four digits indicating the year of independence, the middle four digit denoting the year of India becoming a republic and last three digits for the total number of days in a year. Although there are eleven digits, the chunking (or clustering) them would reduce them into three units (items)
Thus, remembering or not remembering a mobile telephone number depends on our skill to chunk or group separate digits into some meaningful and manageable number of units.
Despite such factors of life interest shaping our memory, there is also an interesting element of commonality. When we receive information from the external world, there is a channel capacity for a human being. The stimulus, be it visual or auditory, impinges on our eyes and/or ears and produces a sensory impression. But this sensory impression is very fragile. It fades away. The individual tries to process some amount of information, but it has a limit.
It has been observed that seven items constitute the limit. A popular expression used by psychologists denotes: Magic number 7 2. It implies that people in general can remember only seven items following a short and brief single-item exposure. If somebody tells us a telephone number by uttering each digit once in a sequential manner, we can remember seven digits that constitute the whole or part of a telephone number. Of course, there is a variation. The capacity ranges from five to nine, with seven as the average success.
There are two fundamental implications derived from this proposition. First, this channel capacity of seven items (such as seven digits in a telephone number) constitutes our short-term memory. We see or hear something, and receive them; neural processing and retrieval is limited to seven. Suppose we see a telephone number of a doctor from the directory, try to remember it, use it subsequently by recalling the information, and then the matter is over. The whole business is that of the short term storage.
If we intend to keep it longer for future use, we adopt a process of rehearsal, we repeat the items silently or sub-vocally or vocally. The materials now have a chance to pass from the short-term storage to long-term storage. In sum, rehearsal is essential to transfer the short-term memory to long-term memory.
Second, the question arises as to whether it is possible to remember more than seven items through the use of some techniques. The answer is ‘yes’. It is possible to remember more than seven digits of a telephone number using the mechanism of chunking. Chunking means grouping. When each digit is a discrete one, each one constitutes an item. If several digits could be grouped, a large number of digits can be converted into a small number of items. Suppose, somebody’s telephone number is 444 666 555 333. Although it has twelve digits the person can very easily group these into four items, each item consisting of three same digits. Let us examine another illustration. Sombody’s telephone number is 19471950365. For all practical purpose, the person would visualize it as three items: the first four digits indicating the year of independence, the middle four digit denoting the year of India becoming a republic and last three digits for the total number of days in a year. Although there are eleven digits, the chunking (or clustering) them would reduce them into three units (items)
Thus, remembering or not remembering a mobile telephone number depends on our skill to chunk or group separate digits into some meaningful and manageable number of units.