GUEST AUTHOR: MS STEPHANIE KINDON
Acting Head of Glebe House, Senior Psychology Teacher
Encode, Store, Retrieve, Repeat. Have you ever thought about how your brain works to allow you to memorise information? Sometimes the way that we study isn’t effective, resulting in information being lost and forgotten. Knowing more about memory and specific strategies might help you study for your upcoming exams.
Memory is the ability to encode (register/process), store (record) and retrieve (recall/recognise) information. There are three main forms of memory: sensory memory, short-term memory and long-term memory.
- Sensory memory allows you to retain sensory information briefly. An example of this is fast moving lights in darkness, which sometimes appear to leave a trail.
- Short-term or ‘working memory’ lasts for approximately 20 seconds and can hold 7±2 items. One example of short-term memory is rehearsing a phone number in your mind so that you can write it down before you forget it.
- Long-term memory has an unlimited capacity and duration, and can last for our entire lives. Long-term memories can be facts (“Berlin is the Capital of Germany), skills (how to ride a bike) or events (personal experiences).
Below are some specific strategies that Ashley Harper (2010) recommends for each of the three stages of our memory process: 1) attention/encoding, 2) storage/consolidation and 3) retrieval.
Ashley Harper (née Dolan, 2010) – Clinical Neuropsychologist and Grammarian
1) Encoding:
For encoding, strategies are typically to ensure you are attending to the thing to be remembered by reducing distractions such as noises, TV, loud lyrical music, conversations, and interactions with people/animals. Consider using the following strategies:
- Making sure you eat so you’re not distracted by hunger
- Sleeping so that you can focus attention
- Taking breaks so that you aren’t fatigued and can pay attention
- Making sure you are paying attention to what you are reading or doing and not idly reading paragraphs without taking in the content.
2) Consolidation and Storage:
For consolidation and storage, strategies would relate to how you organise information in your mind – consider the following:
- Using heuristics
- Writing notes
- Repeatedly learning/reading information to take it in
- Breaking down information into context relevant domains so you are remembering related pieces of information
- Taking a nap after revising or learning new areas of information, as that helps with consolidation of information
- Re-learning old information by revising
- Studying material in different multi-sensory formats where possible e.g. for the same information you could write notes, create diagrams, and draw figures.
3) Retrieval:
For retrieval, consider using different methods to remember information such as free recall and recognition. Sleeping well also helps with retrieval.
- If you can’t remember one topic, try to remember related information e.g. when trying to remember the name of a tiger such as a Bengal tiger, you may remember it’s habitat, which may then lead you to remember where the tiger comes from and hence to remember it’s name
- Focusing on the unusual aspects of concepts can help enrich recall of information e.g. remembering the unusual Latin name for lead – plumbum – can help you to remember its chemical symbol Pb
- Making information self-relevant e.g. remembering memories of a trip you took to the Tower of London could help you to remember some facts of British history.
Try adding one new study skill each week, or practise one aspect of memory (e.g. retrieval) for the first month. As you practise more, try adding more skills.