Explore your memory survey Here you can learn more about the content of 'Explore your memory' without participating in the survey. (However, if you've come here by mistake, you can still take the test.)
About Explore your memory
Explore your memory consists of 10 sections of activities and questions. Participants' answers contribute to a national scientific survey being conducted by researchers at the University of Edinburgh.
The activities mainly cover different aspects of working memory.
Working memory helps us to keep track of where we are and where we are going when driving around town. It helps us remember which cars are currently behind or beside us on the motorway, what someone just said to us, or a telephone number long enough to press the correct keys. The information in our working memory is constantly being updated, so we need to remember the information for only the few seconds that it is needed, and then it is replaced by something new. Sometimes people refer to this as short-term memory.
Part 1: Spot the difference – visual recognition memory
The first part of the survey asks test takers to look at
photographs of scenes from everyday life at the front of a house, for example.
After they've had a good look, the scene is shown again a few seconds later,
and they are asked to say if they've spotted a subtle change in the scene. They
can also choose 'no change'.
This is a test of visual recognition memory.
Remembering detail of a scene
When looking at scenes in pictures or in real life, we often
take in only enough information to allow us to recognise what is important at
the time. For example, to recognise a scene on a beach we do not have to
remember every fine detail about the people, the chairs or the ice cream
seller.
We only remember those details that we actually need
unless we have some reason to focus on something very specific about the
picture.
Our visual recognition memory has limited storage space. If we
were to remember all of the details in every scene we encountered, we would soon
run out of space. Our memory deals with this by storing only minimal
details, but this makes it more difficult to spot subtle changes.
 |  | | In a scientific study, burglars were better at seeing detail like open windows, alarms and cars in the drive
Professor Robert Logie, University of Edinburgh
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Burglars are better
A group of former burglars were shown photos of houses
similar to one in the test. They were found to be statistically better at
spotting changes in the appearance of a house that were related to burglary (eg
a burglar alarm or a 'beware of the dog' sign) than non-burglars. The
theory is that their 'profession' requires attention to small burglary-related details
about houses, and therefore they have a motivation to focus on and remember
those details.
Estate agents and house buyers would be more likely to
remember details such as the colour of the door, how many rooms there are and the
appearance of the garden. Again, what they remember is linked to what they
focus on and this is affected by their specific interests.
If you're not a burglar or an estate agent, visual recognition
memory still comes in handy. For example, you can use your visual memory
to remember where you just left your car keys, where you parked your car or to
remember the way out of an unfamiliar building.
Part 2: Memory binding
In part two, people are asked to remember three things about a series of objects - colour, shape and position on the screen. This tests a theory called 'memory binding'.
Memory binding relates to your ability to tie things together in your working memory and update them when they change. You need this skill for everyday activities like driving a car.
Part 3: Numbers – digit span
In part three, test takers are asked to remember a series of numbers that gets longer as the test progresses. Participants' working memories are filled with numbers until they can't hold any more, in order to test their digit span.
Our ability to remember sequences of numbers (digit span) and letters over short periods of time is collectively known as 'verbal working memory capacity'. This type of memory helps us to remember a telephone number long enough to dial it. It also seems to be important for remembering a new word that we have never heard before, for example, in a foreign language.
Language matters
Interestingly, the language you speak can affect the results of the digit span test. When researchers gave the same test to children in Wales and England, they were puzzled when the Welsh children had lower scores. They eventually discovered that it takes longer to say numbers aloud in Welsh than it does in English. And the length of time it takes to say a number affects digit span performance. Once this difference was accounted for, the Welsh and English scores matched.
Other factors can affect number memory, including stress, tiredness, whether you are paying attention and how fast you speak. Some people might be better at remembering visual patterns than they are at remembering numbers.
You can improve your performance slightly by saying the numbers more quickly and repeating them aloud. But we wouldn't recommend doing that if you're trying to remember your bank PIN in public! It can also help if you say the numbers over to yourself inside your head without saying them aloud.
Yet another way of improving your memory for numbers is to 'chunk' them. So instead of remembering 849537, try 849 537.
Part 4: Grid patterns – visual working memory capacity
In part four, people are shown randomly generated patterns made up of coloured squares to test the storage capacity of their visual working memory. They are asked to reproduce patterns that get progressively bigger and more difficult to remember. If they get two wrong in a row at the same level of difficulty, the test stops.
Our visual working memory capacity is the point at which our working memory reaches its limit to hold any more visual information.
Lots of everyday activities require a good visual working memory. Artists, designers and architects would particularly benefit if they had a good visual memory capacity.
Even though the patterns shown in part four look a bit like a chess board, chess experts do not have an advantage. The reason for this is that a chess player remembers patterns that have meaning in the world of chess. Likewise, if one of the patterns looked a bit like an animal, people would have less trouble remembering it. Because the patterns are randomly generated, it's much harder to remember them.
Has evolution limited our memories?
Some scientists think there is an evolutionary explanation for our limited working memories. The evolutionary advantage of a limited working memory is that it allows us to focus on the task at hand and not be distracted with loads of pointless detail.
Part 5: Everyday objects – coin and stamp
In part five, we ask people to remember which way the Queen's head faces on a UK pound coin and on a standard UK 1st class stamp. Many people get this test of long-term memory wrong. Similar tests have been repeated many times around the world, using different coins, and the result is always the same.
Just because we see an object frequently it doesn't necessarily mean that we'll remember it accurately. Normally we only have to remember enough information to be able to identify a pound coin among a handful of change, and which way the Queen faces is not needed for this. We're better at remembering things that are important to us. So, people who collect coins or stamps are more likely to do well on this task.
Part 6: Spot the difference – visual delayed recall
In part six, we ask people to spot a subtle change to a photograph of an everyday scene we showed them earlier in the test. This question tests visual delayed recall.
We are remarkably bad at remembering details from everyday scenes. It's difficult to remember details that seem unimportant at the time. For example, if we told you that someone in a photograph of a park scene would disappear, you'd have less trouble answering. But if you're asked to remember everything about the scene, it's much harder.
While our ability to remember subtle changes in a scene isn't particularly good, our ability to remember entire scenes is actually rather good as long as each scene is very different. Researchers have reported that people who were shown up to 10,000 different pictures could recognise 90% of them when they were mixed up with pictures they hadn't seen before.
You could try something similar by doing this face recognition test to see how many you can remember.
To test delayed recall thoroughly, we'd have to ask a lot more than one question. We just wanted to give people the chance to exercise this aspect of their memory.
Part 7: Sentences – working memory span
In part seven, people are asked to read a series of sentences and say whether they are true or false. Then they must try to remember the final word of each sentence in the order they were shown. This is a test of what psychologists call 'working memory for processing plus storage'. This means that you must think logically about a series of sentences (processing) and then remember the order of the final words in the sentences (storage). This section requires people to think and remember at the same time.
To remember the final words, most people work back through the true and false questions they answered. It becomes more difficult to answer as the number of sentences increases. The largest number of sentences they are able to answer correctly gives their limit (capacity) for this type of memory.
The test also measures how quickly people click true and false. The scientists are interested in whether the speed that people can respond (the processing time) is related to their memory capacity. They are also interested in whether answers to the questions on exercise and mental activities (in part ten) are related to how quickly people can decide true or false and their working memory capacity.
Part 8: Man and ball – spatial manipulation in working memory
In part eight, people see a cartoon man with a blue ball in one hand and a white ball in the other. They see him in various positions. For example, he may appear upside-down or back-to-front. Test takers must form and rotate a mental image of the man in their working memories and say which of his hands holds the blue ball.
This type of memory is useful in many sports, when packing a car with boxes, imagining what your room would look like with the furniture rearranged, or planning a route using a map. Previous studies using tests similar to this one have found that, on average, men are statistically better at this type of activity than women.
Women tend to do better with tests of verbal memory. For example, if we asked you to think of words associated with the word 'canary' (yellow, feathers, bird, etc), it is predicted that women would score slightly higher, on average.
Scientists are still debating the reasons for these differences.
Part 9: Remembering to do things
In part nine, a 16-question survey tests different aspects of test-takers' memories.
Some of the questions cover memory for the past (retrospective) and memory for future plans (prospective). People with normal memories can have stronger retrospective memories and weaker prospective memories, or vice versa. If you are able to recognise your memory's strengths and weakness, you can take steps to help yourself. For example, if you have a poor memory for future plans, something as simple as keeping a diary can be a big help.
Some of the questions in the survey ask people what they think about their ability for long-term memory and working memory (sometimes called short-term memory). People with normal memories sometimes find that their long-term memory is not as good as their short-term memory, or vice versa. For example, you might be great at remembering what needs to go in the oven next as you cook a big meal, but forget that you made plans to meet your partner at a restaurant.
The survey also assessed whether the test-taker needs a reminder to do something they've planned. For example, if you left a plastic carrier bag by the door or next to your car keys then you'd be more likely to remember to reuse the bag when you go to the supermarket.
Part 10: Lifestyle questions
In part ten, we ask people about their levels of exercise and mental activity as well as lifestyle factors such as whether they smoke or not. Psychologists theorise that exercising and staying mentally active may have a positive effect on memory over time. On the other hand, not staying physically and mentally active, smoking and drinking may have a negative effect.
Smoking and drinking
Scientists have already shown that smoking damages health and drinking alcohol slows down our response time, even within the legal limit for driving. Drinking enough to make you drunk affects your memory for what you were doing when drunk and can also affect your memory the morning after. So, if you're living this kind of life and want to improve your memory, you should consider cutting down.
Drinking to excess on a regular basis can lead to long-term brain damage and serious, permanent memory problems, but we do not yet know whether smoking or less excessive drinking affects memory.
People's answers will help research
The scientists who designed 'Explore your memory' are interested in whether smoking and drinking habits are related to how well people did on the various memory tests and they'll be looking at whether even moderate drinking and smoking affects memory.
'Use it or lose it'
It's already well known that physical exercise can improve health and there is some evidence that doing mental activity such as crosswords can keep your brain active. The scientists will look at all the results from 'Explore your memory' to determine whether memory improves if we do physical exercise and just how much benefit people gain from regular mental activity.
Even before the results of the test have been analysed, enough is known already to recommend that you should adopt a 'use it or lose it'
approach and make sure that you spend some of your time doing mentally stimulating things.
Take it further
That's the end of the test detail.
Now you can:
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