Annoying, isn't it?
You're an attentive person and you care about people.
But no matter what, the names you encounter completely slip your mind.
And it happens in a flash. In one ear and out the other. Zap!
It's not just the names of people either.
We're talking about the names of:
… and even adjectives derived from proper names.
The List Goes On And On!
The question is …
Why is information like this so darned difficult to remember?
Well, you're in luck. Although some of the reasons may shock you, today you're going to learn everything you need to know about exactly why proper names of all kinds of thing challenge your memory.
And as we go along, we'll solve the problem so that names become much easier for you to remember.
Why The Meaning Of Names Fuels The Fire In Your Brain
At the most basic level, some names are easier to remember simply because they mean something as opposed to meaning nothing.
For example, The Great Wall of China and the Berlin Wall are less challenging to remember than Ostkreuz and Shun Yi for most people because the names themselves come soaked in meaning.
But if you hit a name cold with no base line of familiarity … It slides out of your grip like sand.
Certain names also enter your memory at a younger age than others. Bugs Bunny, Marvin the Martian and Donald Duck all hold special favor in my memory because I've been encountering them for years.
But in the John Grisham novel I'm reading right now, I needed to deliberately go out of my way to remember the names of the characters. Names like Troy and Nate are so bland, there's little for the mind to grab onto. Mnemonics to the rescue.
How Authors Trick Your Brain Into Remembering Characters
Other novelists are good at making remember character names easy, however. I'm also reading Blank at the moment.
Author Matt Eaton uses names like Luckman. This naming strategy deliberately attaches meaning to the hero by reducing abstraction to a concrete signal that says this man has a relationship to luck. It tells your brain to look out for signs that confirm or disprove this, making the name instantly more memorable.
On the other hand, the meaning of names spikes in value when Maxine is subtly shifted to Max. This technique asks the reader to think about her name as an object and wonder if she abbreviates it because she's fun and funky or to give her a masculine edge.
The Name-Letter Effect And Your Brain's Endless Name Meaning Search
The truth is that names usually have no meaning. And in the real world, there is no author in the sky using literary tricks to help you remember names or find meaning in them.
But that doesn't stop your brain from seeking the meaning of names when you encounter them.
For example, Jozef Nuttin has demonstrated your brain finds the alphabet letters in your name more attractive than others. Now called the Name-Letter Effect, Nuttin's discovery sheds light on why some people do better in school, gravitate towards certain cities and remember some names better than others.
In the main study, Nuttin presented students ranging from elementary school to university with letter pairs. Some were given random letters. Other subjects were given lists that more closely matched the letters in their names.
Published on 8 years, 10 months ago
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