A "picture in your mind's eye" can be an especially good way to link up ideas. If the ideas are combined into a single mental image, then recalling that image brings both ideas to mind. Notice that the essential feature of the method is seeing the ideas interact together in some way. Let me illustrate the use of imagery in remembering the same name that I used earlier, Durack. My first thought involving a "rack" was a rack of lamb. I then imagined a rose garden with a tiny roasted rack of lamp instead of a flower on a rose bush, with dew drops covering the bush. Hence, "dew" and "rack" could remind me of the name when I reconstructed the mental image in a book store.
I started with this example because the suggested mental image is somewhat bizarre. Some people find it helpful deliberately to try to come up with strange, unusual mental images. However, research on this issue indicates that the important feature is that the ideas are seen as interacting in some way. If the image has to be bizarre in order to accomplish that feature, then so be it.
Although it usually takes extra time to think up an image that reminds you of the items, the result is a lasting memory that you can repeat with confidence. Suppose you want to learn the capital cities of the United States. Here are a few of my own mnemonics:
Santaļ Claus in a broad-rimmed Mexican hat: New Mexico - Santa Fe A garden with unusually tall flowers over my head: Florļida - Tallahassee The Ark filled with animals and rockļing in high seas: Arkļansas - Little Rock A pair of scissors cutting a Valentine heart in half: Connectiīcut - Hartford A pretty girl named Ida holding hands with many boys: Idaho - Boise
Mental imagery is at the heart of two popular mnemonic methods. One is called the Method of Loci because it depends on a mental image of the locations (loci) of items to recall. Can you recall your last family Thanksgiving dinner? Can you place the people as they were sitting around the table? Can you mentally look around each room in your home and count the number of lamps? Can you construct a mental image of the floor plan of your high school so that you can trace your usual path from one room to another? If you can do these things, you can learn to use the Method of Loci.
(Parenthetically, I believe that skill at forming mental images is learnable. That is to say, you can improve the ease and clarity with which you get a picture in your mind's eye. As in all other skills, what is required is practice. Look around the room for a minute, and then close your eyes and try to reconstruct as much of it as you can. Then open your eyes, look around again searching for any objects that you had not imagined. Close your eyes again and repeat. If you practice this in different contexts, including pictures and ads in magazines, you will improve your mental imagery skills.)
To use the Method of Loci, you imagine the to-be-remembered items in a series of familiar places. Let me use a house in which I once lived to recall the countries in Central America. I first enter the hallway where I hear the doorbell (Belize) ringing. In the living room I put a picture of people fishing who got a marlin (Guatemala). The den is a converted garage, and I imagine a car there (Honduras). I have to open the door to the bedroom and see a tube of salve on the bedside table (Salvador). In the bathroom, I see the mirror with my face nicked from shaving (Nicaragua). On the dining room table is a large bowl of cooked rice (Costa Rica), leading to the kitchen where the sink is full of pans (Panama). Of course, your home is probably not arranged that same way, but you can construct your own images as you think of walking through seven rooms.
The other popular mnemonic that uses mental imagery is called the Pegword method because it involves first learning a series of objects that are then used to associate with the to-be-remembered items. The first learning is easy because the words rhyme:
| One is a gun. | Six is a stick. |
| Two is a shoe. | Seven is an oven. |
| Three is a tree. | Eight is a plate. |
| Four is a door. | Nine is a wine. |
| Five is a knife. | Ten is a pen. |
You do not have to use those words ("one" could be a "bun"), and you can follow any familiar sequence such as the alphabet (apple, box, car, dog, etc.) The important feature is that you can easily form a mental image of the pegword.
Using the Pegword method again involves visualizing the pegword and the to-be-remembered item interacting in some way. For example, the first four (inner) planets are Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars. I formed an image of one person aiming a gun at another person who is pleading for mercy (Mercury). Next came an image of a well-dressed person who is minus (Venus) a shoe. A scene containing a tree must be the Earth. Finally, I imagine a cell door with bars (Mars). Thus I can quickly answer such a question as, "What if the fourth planet from the sun?" by saying to myself, "Four is a door" and then getting the image of a door with bars leading me to the answer.
Mental imagery can be helpful in learning a foreign language. The basic idea is to find some part of the foreign word that sounds like an English word that you can link with the English translation in an image. For example, the Spanish word for table is mesa. If you form an image of a "messy table" you can remember the meaning of mesa. The Spanish word for glass is vaso. Imagine a glass being used as a vase with flowers in it. The Spanish word for pen is pluma and you can visualize an old-time quill pen with a long feather or you might see a plum being used as the cap for a pen. It is always the case that your images will be better for you than my images and I encourage you to spend a few minutes practicing more Spanish words.
| cama - bed | ventana - window | zapato - shoe | silla - chair |
| perro - dog | cuchillo - knife | gato - cat | suelo - floor |