I have always wondered about those memories that we have for a few hours or days. Strictly speaking these are not short-term memories — which are usually counted in seconds or minutes — but they’re not long-term memories either. There seems to be a kind of memory that we hold onto for a while and then ‘decide’ to remove it. Take the example of a waiter who can remember what different people have ordered but then ‘forgets’ this as soon as the customers have paid.
This has been called the Zeigarnik effect after a Russian psychologist, Bluma Zeigarnik, who pondered the waiter phenomenon while sitting in a restaurant. Zeigarnik (1927) tested this in a lab by asking participants to do about 20 little tasks, such as solving puzzles and stringing beads. Sometimes participants were interrupted half-way through the task.
Your organisation does not have access to this article.
Sign up today to give your students the edge they need to achieve their best grades with subject expertise
Subscribe
