More than 50 year ago, the American psychologist George Miller published a study that measured people’s mental recall of lists of new information.
Dr Miller concluded the brain’s short-term memory capacity could absorb roughly seven pieces of information. The study become one of the most cited psychology articles in the world.
But when Professor Parker examined Miller’s original data he found the results of his experiments showed the brain could handle only four chunks of information, not seven. Professor Parker believes the popularity of Miller’s research came from its evocative title - The Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two. Some Limits on Our Capacity for Processing Information.
While there were plenty of examples of groupings of seven in society, there were equally as many references to four: four ancient elements, four seasons, four Gospels, four suits in a card pack and Olympic Games every four years, said Professor Parker, whose findings were published in the journal_Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica._
While there was still uncertainty about the processes behind the brain’s storage capacity limits, the consensus supported the four over seven for the amount of information the brain could absorb, Professor Parker said. “There may be no limit in storage capacity per se but [there is] a limit to the duration in which items can remain active in short-term memory.”