Mnemonic scaffolds vary in effectiveness for serial recall

ABSTRACT

Memory champions remember vast amounts of information in order and at first encounter by associating each study item to an anchor within a scaffold – a pre-learned, structured memory. The scaffold provides direct-access retrieval cues. Dominated by the familiar-route scaffold (Method of Loci), researchers have little insight into what characteristics of scaffolds make them effective, nor whether individual differences might play a role. We compared participant-generated mnemonic scaffolds: (a) familiar routes (Loci), (b) autobiographical stories (Story), (c) parts of the human body (Body), and (d) routine activities (Routine Activity). Loci, Body, and Story Scaffolds benefited serial recall over Control (no scaffold). The Body and Loci Scaffold were equally superior to the other scaffolds. Measures of visual imagery aptitude and vividness and body responsiveness did not predict accuracy. A second experiment tested whether embodiment could be responsible for the high level of effectiveness of the Body Scaffold; this was not supported. In short, mnemonic scaffolds are not equally effective and embodied cognition may not directly contribute to memory success. The Body Scaffold may be a strong alternative to the Method of Loci and may enhance learning for most learners, including those who do not find the Method of Loci useful.

KEYWORDS:

• Mnemonic techniques
• mnemonic scaffolds
• serial recall
• Method of Loci
• visual imagery
• embodiment

Acknowledgments

The authors thank James Paterson and Boris Nikolai Konrad for helpful discussions that influenced the experimental design and research questions.

Data availability statement

The dataset generated and analysed during the current study is available from: https://osf.io/ktnpj/

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Not to be confused with the usage of the term “anchor” in the judgement and decision-making literature.

2 Our Story Scaffold Method, where study items are integrated into an autobiographical story from the learners' own life, is not to be confused with the story mnemonic described in reviews by Bellezza (1983, 1986) and Worthen and Hunt (2011, 2008), where word lists are studied by combining the words in sentences that make up an ad-hoc story (and typically not autobiographical).

3 http://memory.psych.upenn.edu/Word_Pools

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported in part by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada [RGPIN-2018-04971].