21. People Have to Use Information to Make it Stick

People Have to Use Information to Make it Stick

            The two ways of moving a memory from short term to long term are repetition and association to something already known. Repetition is used extensively in advertising. Think of all the commercials with jingles that have become stuck in your head (1-800-EMPIRE, IT'S MY MONEY AND I NEED IT NOW, and so on). After hearing them over and over for years, they become part of your long term memory, if you wanted it to or not. It's also easier to dedicate something to memory when you can relate it to something that you already know, making it apart of something else. For example, you can probably picture what your room looks like and most of the objects in it. It would be much harder to remember each individual object you own without the context of your room. This is called a Schema, an idea that is comprised of multiple parts. By adding new memories to preexisting ideas, they're easier to recall.