Question

Alena can recall her friend's long-distance telephone number and five-digit extension, even though the sequence contains 15 digits. One reason for her ease of recall is that she combined the digits into smaller groups. What is this memory technique called?

Select one:
a. recency effect
b. "seven plus or minus two" technique
c. priming
d. chunking

Answer 1

Alena used the memory technique called chunking to remember her friend's long telephone number by breaking it down into smaller, manageable groups of digits, making it easier to remember. The correct option is d.

Step-by-step explanation:

The memory technique that Alena used is called chunking. This technique involves organizing information into manageable units or chunks. Instead of trying to remember a long sequence of numbers as individual digits, Alena grouped the numbers into smaller sets, which makes it easier to remember and recall.

The process of chunking helps to enhance our memory by utilizing the capacity of our short-term memory more effectively, which George Miller cited as the "magic number" 7 plus or minus 2.

Chunking can be particularly useful for remembering phone numbers, dates, and other sequences of information by breaking them down into more memorable chunks.

For example, instead of remembering a phone number as a long string of digits, such as 1234567890, we might remember it in segments like 123-456-7890, which is noticeably easier to recall. The correct option is d.