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Method of Loci

The Method of Loci (Loci being Latin for "palaces"), is a method of memory enhancement which uses visualizations with the use of spatial memory, familiar information about one's environment, to quickly and efficiently to recall information. The Method of Loci is also known as the memory palace or mind palace technique. This method is a mnemonic device adopted in ancient Roman and Greek rhetorical treatises(in the anonymous Rhetorica ad Herennium, Cicero's De Oratore, and Quintilian's Institutio Oratoria) A lot of memory contest champions claim to use this technique to recall faces, digits, and lists of words. These champions’ successes have little to do with brain structure or intelligence, but more to do with using spatial memory^[2] and the use of the Method of Loci.

Contemporary Usage

Many effective memorisers today use the "method of loci" to some degree. Contemporary memory competition was initiated in 1991 and the first United States championship was held in 1997.^[7] Part of the competition requires committing to memory and recalling a sequence of digits, two-digit numbers, alphabetic letters, or playing cards. In a simple method of doing this, contestants, using various strategies well before competing, commit to long-term memory a unique vivid image associated with each item. They have also committed to long-term memory a familiar route with firmly established stop-points or loci. Then in the competition they need only deposit the image that they have associated with each item at the loci. To recall, they retrace the route, "stop" at each locus, and "observe" the image. They then translate this back to the associated item. For example, Ed Cooke, a World Memory Champion Competitor, describes to Josh Foer in his book, Moon Walking with Eisenstein, how Ed Cooke uses the Method of Loci. First, he describes a very familiar location where he can clearly remember many different smaller locations like his sink in his childhood home or his dog's bed. Cooke also advise that the more outlandish and vulgar the symbol to memorize the material the more likely it will stick.