Chapter 5 Exercises: Memory

Part A: Understanding Your Own Memory

Exercise 5.1 — The Encoding Audit (Level 1 | 15 minutes)

Think back over the past week. What do you remember most vividly?

For each vivid memory: 1. What drew your attention to this moment when it was happening? 2. Was there emotional significance? What emotion? 3. Did you process this experience deeply (making connections, reflecting) or shallowly (just passing through)?

Now think of something from this week you have already forgotten or barely remember. 1. Why wasn't it encoded? (Distraction? Automatic behavior? Low emotional significance?) 2. If you had needed to remember it, what would you have done differently?

Exercise 5.2 — Retrieval Practice Test (Level 2 | 20 minutes)

Without re-reading any part of this chapter, write down everything you can remember from it.

Set a timer for 8 minutes. Write continuously — retrieve as much as you can, in whatever order it comes. Don't go back to check; just retrieve.

After the timer: go back and check your recall. What did you remember accurately? What did you miss? What did you distort?

This exercise demonstrates the testing effect — the retrieval practice you just did is more effective for long-term retention than spending the same 8 minutes re-reading the chapter.

Exercise 5.3 — The Dispute Reconstruction (Level 2 | 30 minutes)

Think of a significant conversation or argument from your past — one where you and the other person ended up remembering things differently.

Write your memory of what was said and what happened.
Now write what the other person claimed was said and what happened.
Using the chapter's concepts, identify what factors might have led to the divergence: - Different attentional focus during the conversation? - Different emotional states (encoding is emotion-state dependent)? - Post-event conversations or reflection that shaped the reconstruction? - Motivated reconstruction (each person remembering what served their interpretation)?
Is there a version of the event that both accounts could be partial truths of?

Exercise 5.4 — Your Autobiographical Narrative (Level 3 | 45–60 minutes)

Write a brief "psychological autobiography" with attention to memory dynamics:

The stories I tell about my childhood — the standard narrative you produce when someone asks about your early life. How confident are you that this narrative is accurate? What might it be missing or simplifying?
Memories that have changed over time — think of an event you remember differently now than you did ten years ago. What changed? Did you gain new context? Did you reinterpret it through new frameworks?
The peak-end rule in your life — think of three significant experiences (a trip, a relationship, a job). Does how they ended disproportionately shape how you remember the whole?
The story you haven't told — is there a part of your history that doesn't fit the narrative you typically tell? What would happen to your self-understanding if you integrated it?

Part B: Applying Evidence-Based Strategies

Exercise 5.5 — Spaced Repetition Experiment (Level 2 | Ongoing)

Choose something you want to learn and remember — a language vocabulary, a set of concepts from this book, a skill.

Design a simple spaced repetition schedule: - Day 1: Learn material - Day 2: Review - Day 4: Review - Day 8: Review - Day 15: Review - Day 30: Review

Run the experiment. At each review, test yourself before looking at the material (retrieval practice). After 30 days, assess your retention vs. what you would normally retain from a single study session.

Exercise 5.6 — Deep Processing Practice (Level 2 | Ongoing)

As you read each chapter in this book, practice elaborative interrogation:

For three to five key concepts per chapter: 1. "Why is this true?" — Generate the explanation or mechanism 2. "How does this connect to X?" — Link to something you already know 3. "What personal example does this apply to?" — Ground the concept in your experience

Compare your retention of concepts you process this way vs. concepts you read passively.

Exercise 5.7 — The Peak-End Audit (Level 2 | 20 minutes)

Think of an important relationship, project, or period from your life that you evaluate primarily negatively.

Now ask: How did it end? Was the ending particularly bad, or just average? Is it possible that the ending is doing disproportionate work in your overall assessment?

Reverse the exercise: Think of something you evaluate primarily positively. Did the ending play a disproportionate role?

Reflection: If you could redesign an ending of something currently in your life to produce a more positive memory, what would that look like?

Exercise 5.8 — Sleep and Memory Test (Level 2 | One week)

For one week, track the relationship between sleep quality and memory function:

On days after good sleep (7–9 hours, subjectively restorative), rate your memory function (1–10)
On days after poor sleep, rate your memory function

Also note: Does material you reviewed or experienced before good sleep seem better retained?

Reflection: What does this experiment suggest about sleep as a memory intervention?

Part C: Going Deeper

Exercise 5.9 — The False Memory Risk Assessment (Level 2 | 20 minutes)

The chapter discusses the misinformation effect and false memories. Examine your own memory for these risk factors:

Highly emotional memories from the past — Vivid confidence does not mean accuracy. Think of three very vivid memories. What was your emotional state during each? Have you discussed them with others since? Has the story changed at all?
Memories that have been repeatedly told — Every time you narrate a memory to someone else, you are potentially adding narrative elaboration. Which of your most-told stories have possibly shifted from what actually happened toward a good story?
Memories from early childhood — Research suggests very few genuine memories before age 3; memories between 3–6 are often unreliable. Which of your "earliest memories" might be family stories you have internalized, rather than actual episodic memories?

Exercise 5.10 — Jordan and Dev: Memory Reconstruction (Level 2 | 20 minutes)

Using the chapter's concepts, analyze the Jordan-Dev memory dispute from the opening vignette.

What factors might have led each person to encode the original conversation differently?
In the months since the conversation, what might have happened to each person's memory of it?
Is there a way to resolve the dispute? Or is the question of "what was actually said" in some sense permanently unanswerable?
What practical approach to this kind of disagreement does the chapter's understanding of memory suggest?

Exercise 5.11 — Memory Improvement Design (Level 2 | 30 minutes)

Based on the evidence-based strategies in the chapter, design a 30-day memory improvement experiment for one area of your life where better memory would be valuable.

Specify: 1. What you want to remember better (domain: language, professional knowledge, names, etc.) 2. Your current retention strategy 3. The evidence-based strategy you will use instead 4. How you will measure improvement 5. Your planned schedule

Run the experiment and report back to yourself at 30 days.

Exercise 5.12 — The Forgetting Curve and You (Level 1 | 15 minutes)

Think about the last book, course, or training you completed.

What do you remember from it now?
What was the most important material?
Did you review any of the material after completing it?
What would a spaced repetition review schedule have looked like?

Reflection: How much of the time and money you invest in learning is preserved versus lost to the forgetting curve? What would change if you invested 20% of learning time in spaced review?

Exercise 5.13 — Emotional Memory (Level 2 | 20 minutes)

Identify five memories that have unusual emotional vividness — memories that are significantly more vivid than the average memory from the same period.

For each: 1. What was the emotional context? 2. Does the emotional intensity of the memory match the actual importance of the event? 3. Has the emotional significance of the event changed over time?

Reflection: Do your most emotionally vivid memories accurately represent the most important experiences in your life? Or is emotional intensity an imperfect proxy for importance?

Exercise 5.14 — The Narrative Revision (Level 3 | 45 minutes)

Identify one story you regularly tell about your past — about yourself, your family, or a significant relationship — that you have reason to believe may be incomplete or distorted.

This is the story as you usually tell it: (write it here)

Now try these alternatives: 1. The most charitable version of everyone's behavior in this story 2. The version where you had more agency and responsibility 3. The version that acknowledges what was genuinely difficult without amplifying it 4. The version that includes information you usually leave out

Reflection: Which version feels most true? Which is most useful to carry forward? (These may not be the same thing.)

Exercise 5.15 — Encoding Intentions (Level 1 | Ongoing)

For the next month, practice "encoding intentions" before significant experiences — moments you want to remember well.

Before an important conversation, event, or experience: 1. Take ten seconds to form a clear intention: "I want to remember this." 2. During the experience, briefly focus attention and note a specific detail. 3. After the experience, write three sentences about it — the encoding intention in action.

At the end of the month: Compare your memory for experiences you processed this way vs. comparable experiences you did not mark for encoding.