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Memory Recall - How It Works, and Techniques for Improving Your Own Memory Recall

by Wayne Wargo (PenWay.org)

Did you know that the largest memory recall stimulant for human beings is scent? A unique smell will be remembered and, if you do smell it again, you will then recall the time and place you were when you first smelled it.

Human memory is one of nature's most fascinating phenomena. Memory recall is an associative process that we often have little control over. A person employs recall, for example, when reminiscing about a vacation or seeing movie scenes after hearing its title. Human memory is how the brain represents sensory-specific information during the process of retrieval.

Memory recall is higher for the last items of a list when the list items were received via speech than when they were received via writing. Up to a point, recall is easier the more heightened your emotional state at the time of the events.

Enhanced memory recall is achieved by taking frequent breaks. This gives time for new facts and ideas to relate to each other and previously learned information. The high point of your recall occurs approximately 10 minutes after you have read something. Memory recall is particularly useful in general facilities such as event spaces and banquet halls where it allows appropriate settings for specific situations to be recalled in an instant. Memory recall is greater when the test is conducted verbally rather than visually. It is also richer in detail of facts and past events.

Memory recall is related to your feelings on the subject. For instance, you may have little or no recollection of what you were doing or where you were when you heard the news of JFK being assassinated. This is not due to the fact that you may have a bad emotional memory, but that you are either indifferent or don't have especially strong feelings on the subject. There are personal events; birthdays, weddings and the like where our memory is inextricably linked to the emotion felt within that experience. Memory recall is facilitated through the cues present in the environment and is usually vividly improved, even when recalling memories from years ago. Memory recall is best at 24-hour intervals.

Memory recall is part of the key to hypnotherapy for assisting with the understanding of and coping with past traumas, as the realizations people have in hypnosis typically affect them far more profoundly than with normal conscious awareness. Memory recall is not exact. In fact, it dissipates over time.

Memory recall is in varying degrees of decline. Chances are that memory fades with age since our powers to remember have dulled simply because we're getting older. One may not remember the contents of a magazine article just read, the person they last spoke to, a phone number they were given, etc. Memory recall may be as simple as finding those things that will jog your brain at the time it needs to remember. Why not carry a 2" x 4" little notebook with you and use it when you would like to remember your thoughts or ideas that were just on your mind? Practicing memory tasks such as this one should increase performance on other memorization as well as on related creative tasks.

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