Your Brain: The Missing Manual

Techniques for Better Remembering

If you're like most people, you've had no shortage of opportunities to insult friends and embarrass yourself with unexpected memory slips. Fortunately, there's a way to help. Although studies consistently show that you can't hone your memory simply by using it, you can improve your ability to store information by using a few odd tricks. Ordinary people who learn these techniques can quickly boost their otherwise miserable scores at simple memory tests, like remembering lists of numbers, names, and faces.

The art of improving memory is called mnemonics(pronounced NUH-moniks), and it's a time-honored practice that dates back to classical antiquity. In fact, it just might have started when an ancient Greek philosopher realized he couldn't find his horse and carriage in the Coliseum parking lot. All mnemonic tricks have to be applied at the moment you're actually storing your memories. They help you encode information in such a way that, later on, makes it easier to retrieve from the caverns of your brain.

Mnemonic tricks require a conscious effort, which means they're no help if you don't recognize important information when you see it. Similarly, mnemonic tricks can't help you remember something you've already forgotten.

Note

The question of whether memory decreases in old age (and if so, by how much) is surprisingly controversial. However, some studies, which found small but significant age-related recall deterioration, have also found that better learning ...