Magic Number 7 +/- 2
There's a paper published around 1956 by George Miller (http://www.cogsci.princeton.edu/~geo). He observed that a human, at a time can hold maximum 7 different, totally unrelated things (that's 2.5 bits of information, each bit corresponding to 2 alternatives).
Imagine some one has given u two choices to choose from (let's say an icecream, a shoe)..two unrelated choices..it's easy to choose. Now say, u r given 4 such choices completely unrelated, u can still manage to recall and give a choice. But 7 +/- 2 is the max no of choices tht u can put into ur memory at any instant.
(Assuming normal intelligence level)
His paper:
http://www.well.com/~smalin/miller.html
It has inspired the way bill boards are written, the number of bullets to put in a single slide of ppt, the way the advertisements are shown (max number of unrelated things tht can be shown in an ad)....and many other things.
It's fascinating...that people studied almost every little aspect of human life.
Imagine some one has given u two choices to choose from (let's say an icecream, a shoe)..two unrelated choices..it's easy to choose. Now say, u r given 4 such choices completely unrelated, u can still manage to recall and give a choice. But 7 +/- 2 is the max no of choices tht u can put into ur memory at any instant.
(Assuming normal intelligence level)
His paper:
http://www.well.com/~smalin/miller.html
It has inspired the way bill boards are written, the number of bullets to put in a single slide of ppt, the way the advertisements are shown (max number of unrelated things tht can be shown in an ad)....and many other things.
It's fascinating...that people studied almost every little aspect of human life.
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