Rhythm & Rhyme

Techniques to Improve Memory: Rhythm & Rhyme Examined

Behold some familiar mnemonic jingles:

Many of you will know this jingle, or a variant. “I learned this in childhood, and to this day, when I want to know the number of days in the month (and it’s something that comes up surprisingly often), I run through the first two lines of this jingle” (Fiona McPherson, Mnemonics for study [2nd ed.]).

The first two lines are all that really needed in most circumstances, once you’re familiar with the verse. After all this time, I don’t need the mnemonic to tell me how many days February has, but I do still like to make sure I have the vexed 30-31 question right!

Rhythm and rhyme are powerful aids to memory, but the reason this jingle comes so easily to mind is not because of those two factors alone — it’s because of the frequent repetition I’ve given it. This is something that needs to be borne in mind with all mnemonics — mnemonics make remembering easier, but they don’t obliterate the need for repetition. They simply reduce it. Indeed, you could say one measure of how effective a mnemonic is, is the degree to which it reduces the need for repetition.

Here’s another little jingle that will be familiar to many:

Isn’t it remarkable how much more memorable the addition of a simple rhyme and a meter makes this? Compare it to: In fourteen ninety-two, Columbus crossed the Atlantic.

Here’s one that might be more familiar to British and Commonwealth citizens, commemorating Guy Fawkes Day:

It’s all about rhythm and rhyme.” (Fiona McPherson Mnemonics for Study [2nd ed.])

Rhyme

Rhyme is an effective cue to remembering for similar reasons as first-letter mnemonics Opens in new window: because of the way words are filed in memory Opens in new window, and because it provides constraints on the possibilities. Think of songs and poems that you can easily finish the line for, simply because the word seems obvious — because of the constraints of context and rhyme.

That tells us something. It tells us that an important variable in deciding whether a rhyme is effective is the extent to which it is predictable. Predictable rhymes, although it may seem counter-intuitive, are generally more effective — hence the banality of most popular and long-lasting mnemonic verses, like those I have just quoted.

Rhythm

Rhythm is a little more complex. Rhythm takes us to music, and perhaps we should start by considering why music helps us to remember. Or at least, how it helps us remember.

Singing to Remember

Research has convincingly demonstrated that words are more easily recalled when they are learned as a song rather than speech, but only in particular conditions. The important thing is the melody.

The reason melody can be useful is, again, because it provides cues to recall — by virtue of the constraints they place on the possibilities, particularly in terms of line and syllable length. So if melody is to be useful, it is crucial that it be simple and predictable (like rhythm).

Simplicity is not a rigid measure of course. What’s simple to one person, particularly a musically trained one, may not be simple to another. Simplicity also varies with familiarity — the more often we hear a melody, the simpler it’ll become (within limits!).

An important aspect of simplicity is that the text and the music should be closely integrated — specifically, the number of notes in the melody should match the number of syllables in the lyrics.

Simplicity and familiarity are why, if you want to improve memorability by attaching the material you want to remember to a tune, you are best advised to choose a familiar ‘nursery’ song.

Simplicity also impacts on predictability. Predictability is important for the obvious reason that melody helps us remember text to the extent that it produces cues, but also because we remember expected information better.

As far as the lyrics themselves are concerned, context is also an important factor. We can predict the words in a song or poem not simply because of the constraints of rhyme and rhythm, but also because the context sets its own restraints. We know that in a love song, heart might rhyme with part (e.g., we’ll never part), but is never going to rhyme with fart (unless it’s a parody!).

This tells us that related text — text that is coherent and meaningful, that belongs together — is going to be much more effective than unrelated text (such as a list of words).

That doesn’t mean that unrelated text won’t be helped by attaching it to a tune. One study found that, although hearing a list of words sung didn’t help people learn the words any better than hearing them spoken, nevertheless, those who heard them sun took less time to relearn the list a week later. However, there are more effective ways of remembering unrelated items — attaching it to music is not going to help much.

There are other reasons why music helps of course — reasons that have to do with motivation and emotion. Music engages us, and singing is fun. We’re more likely to repeat a song much more often than a spoken passage. This simple fact — the number of repetitions is high — accounts for a great deal of our memory for songs.

Attaching words to a melody shouldn’t be taken as a magic bullet for remembering. But the fact that making something into a song does make it considerably more pleasurable shouldn’t be ignored either.

But if you do try to turn information that you’ve found hard to remember into a song, remember the rules.

Rules for Mnemonic Songs

• Simple, well-known tune.
• Words that match the melody, note by note.
• Words framed in predictable, meaningful sentences and phrases.
• Lines that follow a predictable pattern and rhyme where possible.

There are a number of songs that have been written to help with learning science — for example, Flanders & Swann’s song describing the First and Second Laws of Thermodynamics, Tom Lehrer’s song of the Periodic Table, as well as many more modern songs (did you know there was a Science Songwriters’ Assocation?!) — as well as other subjects (such as Shakespearean prose).

A practical example of a teaching song points to some other interesting issues. A study was done involving a multimedia instructional module, using a computer animated sequence in conjunction with a song about cellular physiology. The program was presented to 5^th and 6^th grade students by two different teachers. One of these teachers was happy to sing along; the other refused. There was a clear difference in the effectiveness of this program, depending on whether the teacher modeled the singing behavior or not.

There was also a clear gender difference, with girls being much happier with, and benefitting more from, the use of song. Partly this may be due to gender differences in music processing, but I suspect the main reason for this difference is cultural — the boys thought singing was “uncool” (a belief not helped, of course, by the male teacher refusing to sing himself).

Spoken Rhythm

Let’s return to rhythm on its own — spoken rhythem.

As with melody, research has had inconsistent results in determining its usefulness as a memory aid, and the reasons are probably the same.

It seems likely that rhythm is helpful to the extent that it:

• creates expectancies,
• sets constraints, and
• makes repetition more pleasurable.

It may also be that spoken rhythm is more likely to be effective as a mnemonic aid when it has a strong musical beat. This would suggest that you will probably enhance memorability if you provide a back beat, most easily by clapping along with your words — but bear in mind that while synchronized physical movement can aid memory, it must be simple enough not to distract from the material you want learned.

It may also be that some rhythms are more effective aids than others. This is suggested by a study that found that reciting the Iliad got the heart beating in time with the breath, which may improve gas exchange in the lungs as well as the body’s sensitivity and responsiveness to blood pressure changes (remember that blood flow, through its effect on oxygen flow, is critical for brain functioning). The researchers believe it is the hexametric pace of the Homeric verse that is critical for achieving this effect. They also suggested that such recitation produces a “feel-good effect”.

There’s also been a study finding that vocalizing the Ave Maria in Latin or a yoga mantra slowed breathing and altered blood flow in the brain.

Dactylic hexameter (dum-diddy, dum-diddy, dum-diddy, dum-diddy, dum-diddy, dumdum), which is the rhythm of classical epics, is unfortunately not one of the more common rhythms in English verse, but its musical counterpart (6/8 time) is common.

However, it should be borne in mind that the most successful (widely used; long-lasting) mnemonic verses are all very short ones. Even the “30 days hath November” verse is one that, personally, I only tend to use the first two lines of, and I confess I had to check my memory of the final three lines on the Web.

The familiar aid to English spelling:

is one that rolls off my tongue with ease, but I didn’t know (or had long forgotten) the rest:

(I also came across this variant, which demonstrates how accurate this “rule” is! — but a useful rule-of-thumb nevertheless:

My point is that, although rhyme and rhythm are useful aids to memory, they are best restricted to very brief jingles. Although long poems have been constructed as mnemonic aids (for example, for learning the English Kings and queens, or the American presidents), you do need to put a lot of effort into memorizing them.