We’ve all experienced the feeling of not being able to remember exactly where one of our memories came from, sitting blankly and trying to recall how we knew that our friend’s favorite color was neon green. Or, in some worse cases, you face a blank math exam and freak out because you suddenly forget the equation of the theorem you were meant to use—you memorized it the night before, but suddenly your mind turns blank. 

All of these problems have to do with the function of your memory. Memory, simply put, is our recollection of past events or facts. Personally, I think it is really important to know about the basics of how memory works. By building up that foundation, we can further enhance our own memory, aiding us in sticky situations like those mentioned above. 

Memory is split into three different categories, each with its own specifics: sensory memory, short-term (working) memory, and long-term memory. I won’t bore you with the functions of the three systems, but what you have to know is the concept of rehearsal. Rehearsal is our mind’s ability to—well—rehearse information and eventually encode short-term memory into our long-term memory. There are two different types of rehearsal: maintenance rehearsal and elaborative rehearsal. Maintenance rehearsal is rehearsing to keep information in our short-term memory by repeating it over and over again. This is like cramming a lot of information the night before your math test. On the other hand, elaborative rehearsal is a type of rehearsal where we are actively trying to understand and connect new information to already learned concepts.
It’s quite intuitive that elaborative rehearsal will be more useful and beneficial in the long term in comparison to maintenance rehearsal. There are some ways for us to enhance our ways of elaborative rehearsal and memorization. In psychology, a set of strategies aimed at helping memorization are called mnemonic devices. There are a couple of ways that you, or anybody in general, could incorporate mnemonic devices into your study habits. One of the most common devices is an acronym. This is where a certain set of words will be linked to one big word, such as ‘OMG’ in text standing for ‘oh my god.’

Personally, I love using association paired with analogy to aid in my studies. The sophomores and upperclassmen would know that Biology is a memory intensive class. There are just so many concepts that we need to know and spit out on tests. One of my godsends for remembering last year was the method of association. Through linking different biological concepts to inside jokes or events in my mind via analogy, I was able to make an impression on my mind. What I found out was that the weirder the idea, the more I was able to remember and cognitively recall it.  

Though these methods are a bit niche, meaning you won’t be able to use them for all classes (I wouldn’t recommend for you to use these in classes that require procedure/algorithmic understandings, such as Chemistry), you can still utilize them in other areas of life—remembering friend’s birthdays or favorite colors, for one. Take these methods with you, and maybe give them a try whenever you have to remember something!