When I first read about Cognitive Load this semester in Edtec 544, a lot of it rang true. I've often noticed that it's easier for me to remember something if I can associate it with something I already know, akin to adding the missing piece to a puzzle. And, in the 70s, my anatomy professor told all of his students, "Memorize it six times and you'll remember it forever." Are these techniques for building schema and transferring short-term (working) memory into long-term memory, respectively?
So, I was intrigued when I came across the paragraphs about Cognitive Load (33.3.1.1 Cognitive Load Theory) in Visual Presentations and Learning. But, my skeptometer went off almost immediately, when Anglin, Vaez, and Cunningham cited George A. Miller’s The Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two. It’s likely I don’t understand Miller as well as they do, but I’m aware of the Myth of Seven and that Miller sometimes disapproves of how his work is cited.
Although they obliquely cite Miller to characterize working memory as conscious and long term memory as unconscious, I couldn’t find any mention of conscious or unconscious memory in Miller’s paper. They claim per Miller that “only seven elements can be stored in working memory,” but Miller said, “We are not completely at the mercy of this limited span, however, because we have a variety of techniques for getting around it….” Similarly, they claim that long-term memory is “almost unlimited.”
All the same, my personal theory doesn’t differ greatly in that I suspect working memory is limited, but the limitation varies depending on the person, the circumstances, and the content under study; and long-term memory is so much more capacious as to appear unlimited, but is similarly limited.
Anglin, G., Vaez, K., Cunningham, K. (2004). Visual Representations and Learning: The Role of Static and Animated Graphics. In D. Jonassen (Ed), Handbook of research on educational communications and technology (2nd ed., pp. 871-872). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers.
Miller, G. A. (1956). The magical number seven plus or minus two: Some limits on our capacity for processing information. Psychological Review, 63, 81–97. Retrieved November 27 2002 from Classics in the History of Psychology.