Success – it’s all about the hours
Ten Thousand Hours – iceberg illusion
Your memory and the
'Iceberg illusion'
• Have you ever claimed that you find it difficult to
remember information e.g. for exams?
• Are there others in your class that appear good at
remembering information?
Try remembering the following letters?
• DRGBMOYTIFWPVX
Established memory research
• According to established psychological research
people with ordinary short-term memory ability
should recall around 7 items (letters in this case)
• George A Miller called this The Magic Number 7 as this was the number of digits most people
could recall.
• Can people with ordinary memory ability recall
much more than 7?
RESEARCH: Can people with ordinary short term
memory ability recall much more than 7 items?
• Psychologist Anders Ericsson performed an experiment to answer
the question.
• He tested people's memory and then worked with them for 2 years
to improve their memory.
• One person, called SF (given letters not a name for confidentiality),
started with a recall of 6-7 items (very ordinary) but after 230 hours
practice over 2 years, how many digits do you think he recalled?
A) 27
B) 56
C) 82
Source: Anders Ericsson, Cambridge Handbook of Expertise & Expert Performance (2006)
ANSWER
»
C - 82
ICEBERG ILLUSION
• If you met SF after his hours of training you would
believe he had a special memory.
• Super memory genes perhaps?
• Ericsson calls this the iceberg illusion. The talent
people see e.g. sport, exam success, is only the
tip of the iceberg.
• Memory hides the huge amount of invisible
hours spent practising.
ICEBERG ILLUSION
• We assume the talent such as remembering
things for exams is natural and that means it isn't
worth us spending hours practising as the ability
is natural not crafted through hours of training.
• The iceberg illusion should encourage all
students to practice and revise.
• A friend of SF tried to improve his memory as
well and reached 102 digits!
STORY OF SUCCESS
- IMPROVING MEMORY
•
Memory improvement came with hours of practice - but hours spent wisely.
•
In the case of SF he used mnemonic (memory tricks) eg think of a story that links
each letter or number
Eg Using letters to create stories
TBAC
The bee ate cake
Eg method of loci
Think of each digit linked to an item in a familiar room eg a classroom
• On the door is a T
• On each desk is a B
• On the ceiling is an A
• The teacher is holding a C
Iceberg Illusion
• SF and others spent hours and hours
practising these memory techniques so that
they eventually looked as if they had amazing
natural memories
• It was all through the hours of deep practice –
not just hours but hours spent actively trying
to learn and improve