As students in an Academic setting, I believe that we can all relate to and understand the
importance of retrieval in memory and in academic subject content. After all, if we are unable
to retrieve things from our memory, all of the things that we have spent hours and years
studying are of no value to us. There are many ways recommended throughout our textbook to
encourage and support memory retrieval, but I will be focusing on visual imagery.
Visual imagery is a mental picture that is able to capture how something might actually
look or what it already looks like and it relies on some of the same specific processes and brain
regions that enable visual perception (Omrod, 2016). Studies show that people are often able to
better remember things if they have seen a visual example while the memory construction was
taking place. A study performed in 2017 looked at how adolescents are able to retrieve
mathematic information and found that it is achieved through 3 pathways: quantitative, spatial,
and linguistic. Visual imagery would fit in with the spatial category in this case, which has
proven to be vital in mathematics. Because mathematic problems are typically very complex,
having the information presented in a spatial and visual manner is vital in order for the
information to be accurately solved (Traff, Skagerlund, Olsson, & Ostergren, 2017).
For myself, I know that visually seeing the information that is being presented to me is
vital in retrieving it from my memory when I need it. For example, with this course I am better
able to remember things that have been associated with graphs or diagrams that help me to better
understand and visualize the information. Taking the time to write out notes rather than simply
reading is also beneficial because I am able to see the words on paper in front of me and recall
them more effectively. Visual imagery is something that is a Biblical principle as well. For
example, when I think about the 10 commandments I am reminded that The Lord did not simply
tell His people what to do, but He also gave them a clear visual example of the standards and
expectations He had for them as we see in Exodus 20.
References
Ormrod, J. E. (2016). Human Learning. J.W. Johnston (Ed.). University of Northern Colorado:
Pearson
Träff, U., Skagerlund, K., Olsson, L., & Östergren, R. (2017). Pathways to arithmetic fact
retrieval and percentage calculation in adolescents. British Journal of Educational
Psychology, 87(4), 647–663. https://doi.org/10.1111/bjep.12170
