Memory Teacher: Perception Means Everything

Memory has many applications, specifically, it's the ability to aid in learning throughout schooling, but more importantly what comes after, when you enter the workforce. Throughout the world, there are many jobs that require a higher level of cognitive thinking. We might think of these jobs being doctors, nurses, scientists, engineers, and many others, but it is more simple than that. Even grocery workers, bus drivers, and gymnastics coaches utilize the many memory techniques there are in cognitive psychology literature.

In my case, I will be exploring the possibility of graduate school after a year of graduation. Why is this? I would like to take a gap year to fully develop a plan of action, and whether or not I truly would like to spend all the time and money it takes to get into graduate school. So, how should I fully prepare myself for graduate school if that's the path I choose? Well, the answer can remain unclear, and very flexible. There are a large number of memory strategies I can utilize in encoding, retaining, and memorizing the education I have learned over the past four years. This vast amount of strategies can be easily broken down into the most commonly used practice's research supports today.

Research Today

Upon viewing research, I had found the most commonly used memorization strategies today. Why? Because it is important to understand information is never forgotten, it is simply either:

1. Failure to store in the first place
2. The inability to find and retrieve that information, or
3. Failure to store the information to the point it can not be found

Therefore, these common strategies used can be broken down into different categories.

Assign meaningfulness to things: Dual-Coding Theory

Assigning meaning to things can be easily related to Dual coding. Dual coding uses both visuals and words to help us better make associations with concepts. Originally this theory of cognition was developed by Allan Paivio, where he stated “mental imagery can aid in the development of learning and memory” (Paivio, 2013).

Based on this graph we can pull a key concept from this theory. “Perception means everything”. Since Allan had broken down this theory into the exposure of stimuli, senses, and then leading into working memory and long-term memory I believe there are ways we can improve this concept. Thus, this idea helps with the development of an intervention I would like to propose.

Since most of our daily lives are affected by what we perceive I believe that writing down certain stimuli that stands out to us in our daily lives will help with memory. This will be an effective way to dual-code, as well as adding another “step” towards this process. By writing down certain stimuli that affected us in that moment or memory we can better put ourselves there in that moment in time when we are in the retrieval process. For example, I keep my own diary to myself by which I write down my dreams, my daily thoughts, feelings, and emotions. This helps me understand, and put my mental self in that specific situation. I have been doing this technique for over a year now and I have seen significant improvement in my memory. By reading the words I have written down in regards to a certain memory my perception is not “tripped up” or influenced by incorrect memories. When applying this concept towards learning, or even schooling I have found that pointing out certain words, or visuals can elaborate on the topics or situations you are memorizing. For example, when reaching out to my mom who is a nurse, I had asked the following.

“In the typical workday do you have to memorize individuals personally?”

She had answered me, “Yes, as a nurse we meet many patients every day by which we have to quickly glance at their charts before their appointments. We typically will have a follow-up appointment for many, by which we refer to our notes about that patient to fully memorize the situation. I as well have to take short notes for the doctors to refer to while the patient is in the room, and talking with the doctor. Not only Does this help me memorize their chart, but it provides a verbal aid for the doctor to refer to.” Therefore, this new intervention incorporating written components and dual coding can be shown efficient in the memory process. We can often times see this relate to rote-learning.

Rote Learning: Repetition

Rote learning is a memory technique based on repetition. This concept suggests that individuals will be able to quickly and efficiently recall the meaning of a concept the more it is repeated. This type of learning is also a system by which rewards precision and quantity. Overall, incentivizing information overthinking and creativity. Thus, overall producing computers rather than individual thinkers. Looking at the implications of this type of learning strategy we can see an emphasis on meaningfulness. We know that concepts are more easily remembered if they are meaningful. Therefore, when looking at repetition learning, one major role that could play here is the motivation behind the learning and even the order they are learning in. A study by (Alper, 1946) also found similar conclusions. “Immediate recall and intention learning are superior to delayed recall and incidental learning, respectively only under task-orientation, but not under ego-orientation instructions.”Therefore, this suggests that material is not learned faster than more meaningful material when the position is taken into account. Another principle states that within a list, items located at the start and end are more easily mastered. This has been confirmed by research and it is applicable to both nonsense and meaningful material (Vinacke & Smith 1959). When applying this to intervention, we could simply start with meaningful information that is more difficult to learn, then moving on to the middle information that is already mastered, and then finally other harder information at the end. This “sandwich” technique would be supported by research because the start and ending information have been shown to be mastered more rapidly.

When asking my mom n how rote learning or repetition comes into play at her doctor's office she said,

“Repetition has a lot to do with the different patients you interact with every day. Sometimes you get patients who act similarly to others, and sometimes you do not. The repetition allows me to better understand how to interact with individuals of all different kinds of personalities.”

Thus, this type of repetition allows for her to better prepare herself for new encounters. This then leads me towards the hypothesis. Rote learning not only relates to learning new information, but retrieving old information to form new conclusions, and perceptions on what is going on in the present. Therefore, this truly shows how rote learning is useful in encoding, and in retrieving information. While dual-coding on the other hand merely focuses on the perception of stimuli in regards to other stimuli you have experienced.

Lastly, the third and final technique I would incorporate into my intervention proposal is the usage of memory devices. There are many different memory devices you can use when trying to memorize information such as:

Memory devices

1. Acrostics

Working off the first letter of a word to make a list or a phrase: Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally stands for, (parentheses, exponents, multiplication, division, addition, subtraction) and is found to help with mathematical related problems.

2. Chunking

Putting information into meaningful groups called “chunks” to increase learning efficiency or capacity. By picking out the difficult parts, or problem areas you can slowly start incorporating other information into the piece.

here we can see how the sequence is separated into “chunks” each chunk represents a different category meaningful to the individual.

Here we can see another example of chunking. If this was a grocery list and an individual was trying to memorize they would place them into meaningful categories shown above.

3. Method of Loci

This method is a strategy of memory enhancement as well as the others. Similar to dual-coding this method uses visualizations of similar spatial environments to enhance the recall of information. Derived from the Latin word for places, this method is most importantly focused on the environment around you.

Here we can see different objects labeled different numbers, causing these “leading lines and helping us move through space visually.

Closing Thoughts

Overall, there is a wide variety of memory strategies we can use. There are also many ways these strategies can be applied in work-life. But, I believe my intervention closely related to dual-coding and repetition can really impact individuals in a positive way. Not only does my intervention focus on perception, and how we perceive the world as it is happening to us, but it also focuses on more than one input. Taking our memories and elaborating on them shortly after it occurs, and as well as creating visuals and mental representations to aid in that encoding and storage. Lastly, I just wanted to point out without our ability to perceive the world around us there could be no possible way to memorize our surroundings whether it is school-related, work-related, or personal information memorization is vital for human cognition.

Paivio, A. (2013). Mind and its evolution: A dual coding theoretical approach. New York: Psychology Press.

Vinacke, W. E., & Smith, E. M. (1959). Meaningfulness and Position in Rote Learning. Psychological Reports, 5(2), 441–447. https://doi.org/10.2466/pr0.1959.5.h.441

Rote Learning is not bad, overdose is

https://medium.com/@kriteeshparashar/rote-learning-is-not-bad-overdose-is-5c5156f1ea2c

https://www.dal.ca/news/2013/11/20/study-tips--top-5-memorization-techniques.html