Comments on: The Rule Of 7

By: Mikes

Mikes — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 18:59:06 +0000

This article is cute and funny. I’d agree there’s magic in the number 7. It’s in fact the holy number in the Bible. God created the whole universed and rested on the 7th day. Jesus said give and it will come back to you 7 * 7. and a lot more about 7. This is great information. Thanks!

By: Yaro

Yaro — Thu, 08 Sep 2005 12:08:30 +0000

Hi Chris, yes it was George Miller I believe Malcolm Gladwell was referring to in his book that I took this topic from. I guess if you are shooting for the greatest average 7 is a safe bet when it comes to writing articles online.

Interesting to see the watership down term Hrair mentioned in the wikipedia entry on the topic. Thanks for the link.

By: Chris Tregenza

Chris Tregenza — Thu, 08 Sep 2005 08:06:50 +0000

The magic number seven coves from work by psychologist George Miller [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Magical_Number_Seven%2C_Plus_or_Minus_Two ] who first identifed that short-term or working memory is about 7 numbers. This was later expanded apon to 7 chunks of information.

The important thing to remember is that it is 7 plus or minus 2. So as many people can remember only five chunks as there are people who can remember nine.

This is also a very simplistic concept of memory that only really applies to abstract things such as telephone numbers. Things that evolutionary speaking are not important. What we remember well are stories. Show someone a thirty second advert and they will remember far more about it than most people would expect: what people look like, body language, background music, dialog etc etc. Simply because its presented in a narrative format.

You may find this interesting from my own blog: Teach Briefly, Teach Often

By: Benjamin Riches

Benjamin Riches — Thu, 08 Sep 2005 06:58:41 +0000

Currently live at house number 7! But planning on a move! My father believes it’s a lucky number, whereas mine is most definitely 3. The Chinese are absolutely mad for number 8, as they believe it’s incredibly lucky.

By: Apollyon

Apollyon — Thu, 08 Sep 2005 00:08:30 +0000

Hmm. There are a lot of psychological factors at work here in regards to the number seven. The number seven obviously represents our 7 days in a week. The memory problem isn’t so much due to our mental capacity, but due to the fact that there ARE only seven days in a week. As a result our memory is accustomed to thinking of things in a 7 block period. I will think of what I have todo on Monday and then Tuesday and so forth. So from an early stage our memory gets accustomed to 7 periods.

This subconscious memory training will obviously have affects on our ability to remember lists or ideas that stretch beyond seven items.