How can the way in which we organise our thinking by using mental images, concepts and schemas help us improve our memory?

There are many methods that can be used to improve our memory; in this essay we will look at the principles of mental images, concepts and schemas and how organising our thoughts can help improve our memory and our memory recall. In order to fully understand these principles, it is necessary to look at each method in turn, discuss the supporting evidence and evaluate how each can work in our favour. To gain a full insight; we need to also understand their restrictions and how each one can be subjective to the individual using it.

The first way of improving memory is by using mental images, this can be used as a means to organise our thoughts by us creating iconic images in our heads (big, bold and colourful work best) and when amalgamated with semantic thought, these images provide an effective method of fixing the memory and providing better recall. This technique is often utilised when learning a new language and has been proven to be a successful way to remember basic vocabulary. An example defined by Spoors et al. 2011): imagery showing a bell being used as a bin can be used as a learning aid for the French word “poubelle” meaning “bin” as the illustration breaks down the unknown word into English counterparts which are then imagined as tangible objects – in this case a person lifting the lid off the bell shaped bin and exclaiming “pooh” at the stench giving us a pooh-bell thus remembering the word. Michael Raugh and Richard Atkinson (1975, cited in Spoors et al, 2011) developed the key word technique and conducted an experiment on two groups of people. Both groups were tasked with learning 60 words. The group who used the keyword technique scored an average of 88% compared to the group who did not having a score of 28%. This