[N0c7urn3]

I have a horrible memory for details (unless I'm explicitly trying to memorize details, that is). But I'm quite good at math.

I'm also good at recalling pertinent information (and also a lot of tangential ones) when I require it, and I'm not surprised that my mind works that way, given that human memory is not designed for details: it's adapted to create context out of relevant information. Because storing individual episodes is inefficient as compared to interleaving new information with the old, albeit at the expense of details, memory is more reconstructive than reproductive.

[Idiotes]

I was only reciting today an instance when we found an old Lamberetta behind my Nan's fence, this was when I was 5 years old - apparently - and I was speaking about details as if it was only yesterday. I guess that must be the result of boring life.

[envirodude]

	Originally Posted by Cerebrate To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	Do you have a good memory? How good are you with details(concrete)? How good are you at remembering a tasks or methods that should be executed in a sequential manner (methodical tasks)?

Poor memory overall.
Concrete details - very poor.
Methodical tasks - excellent memory.

	how good are you at Math (Advanced\University level Math) and how good are you at Accounting? what do you think of Accounting? Do you think your memory capacity or lack thereof has something to do with your psychological preferences as indicated by your mbti type?

Math - excellent
Accounting - good
mbti - yes, I think I favour conceptual thinking because I'm much better at that than anything sensory.

[mrvontar]

My memory sucks, it definitely affects my math skills. Math builds on itself, plus you have to memorize a lot of formulas. It's something that bothers me, that my memory is so bad. I think my memory is used to rapidly processing information and then discarding it, I hear you can strengthen your memory so I think it may be logical that you can also make it worse. Once, for example, I was taking a test and halfway through a problem I forgot the formula I had been using to solve it. Part of the reason why I want to learn Japanese is in hopes it will also make my memory better, that after memorizing so much information repeatedly I may be able to memorize other things easier.

[Mohammad]

I tend to remember details that aren't important on the surface of it but I file them away until they prove to be of use in making an informed decision.

[TheWanderer]

Only ones I would have felt important

[cartilas]

I completely relate to what you are saying here. I love facts, but I tend to only use them to fine tune my understanding of any particular topic. I am a huge fan of Google as my memory for facts is so poor, I tend to have the understanding without the concrete detail. Google can fill in the gaps for me. For example, I am a Sys Admin and I have a huge understanding of computer systems and when things go wrong, i know exactly what the problem is, however, i use Google to discover the step by step processes needed to fix the problem. If only i could have a direct feed to Google in my brain, i would indeed be a genius
To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
. I also believe that this is why a lot of INTJ struggle with the idea of being intelligent, because they have good understanding without concrete details to back it up, unlike INTP's who rely on these concrete details for their understanding.

Originally Posted by Cerebrate To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

Thank you for all your responses, its certainly more than I expected. I am liking this forum already. The reason for the question is because I beleive that a person with an intj preference has a tendency to want to abstract and create conceptual systems based on their experiences\observations, as such, they are not really interested in concrete particulars\details which they discard\dismiss as being mere contingent. Hence a need to detect underlying repeating patterns rather than focus on particulars. Hence they do not remember concrete details since concrete details are not as import as understanding the abstract system or pattern behind the phenomena. I have noticed that I get very impatient and irritable when I have to do deal with details and particulars, especially when I cannot see the bigger picture and discern the why behind all of it. Everything must fit in a system and I must understand the system from the top down. I think I should have rephrased the question to, Do you have a good memory for details? [fixed]

[Danielw]

My everyday memory is terrible. Anything people tell me about themselves orally disappears immediately after the conversation is over.

Now I have learnt a number of mnemonic techniques and tend to apply them to remember books, articles, new vocab, etc. This works really well for me because then you have general rules and techniques that can structure the mess of arguments and factoids to remember.

[Mephos]

I forget mostly important things that other people care about and minor things that I like. I remember nearly everything else.

[Gefyon]

I have an exceptional memory certain things (random facts and numbers!) and not so good memory when it comes to other things (where I put my keys and how movies ended).

I am fairly good with details - up to a point. I can get "lost" in the details at times.

I am very very good with linear math, not so good with geometry and spatial stuff. And I am excellent at accounting. It is a system, and a rather elegant one at that, based on a beautifully simple equation. Building and perfecting accounting systems is something I have a knack for - along with organizing/manipulating data and extracting useful information from it.

[ZeroBlue]

I have a great memory for details! Now, what was the original question of this thread again? Something about potatoes right? I prefer the red ones.

[avanteguardej]

I have somewhat of a system with memorizing facts or details. If I deem it important or interesting enough, then I will easily remember it. However, if I determine that I can find this information quickly in the future, I will discard it immediately. Sometimes, this system fails because the data is not readily available when I need it and also because I don't find most things in daily life interesting and am preoccupied with what I do. Many times, I have driven to the store for a specific thing and left without it because I am daydreaming. I have a pretty abstract relationship with time and most often do not identify specific dates with events.

Oh, I am pretty good with math if it is definitive and not theoretical. I don't like predicting things based on guesstimating.

[Mohammad]

I remember details that do not appear to be relevant initially, but become relevant when discussing the matter in retrospect.

[Melharmonic]

I have a terrible memory for anything related to numbers, dates, directions, etc. I think my memory may have been better when I was younger, but, of course, I can't remember.

[hrath]

Mines great. I dedicate most things to memory.

[sed0007]

My memory is somewhere between 'photographic' and 'idiot savant'.

I cannot remember peoples' names, but can remember the make; model' year; color and condition of the automobile/motorcycle of everyone I have ever met.

When leafing back through a book for a reference or a citation, I cannot remember the page number, as I do not 'read' those, but I can remember the location spatially of the text I need to find (right or left page; top; middle; or bottom of that page).

As to autos, my memory is encyclopedic: cubic-inch displacement/horsepower of most of the engines ever built by Detroit.

Trivia maxima.

[Cacao]

When I am alone and I do not have to talk I can memorize most and best. When I am around people ,interacting, I am distracted and the way I think and memorize changes and reduces my efficiency to minimum. I can if alone memorize a lot. Also resting helps me. I can memorize poetry, 3D, thoughts, names, years and numbers well, but I tend to forget them if I do not see them or repeat them for second time. Usually there is also some stuff that I can not remember at all. No matter how hard I try. It is funny, because some much more complicated things I can remember really easily. And if I memorize something the wrong way I have to make carefull adjustements to correct it so I do not make a faulty memory.

[eGadfly]

My memory is hit or miss. I can recall all sorts of things about a lecture, but ask me to remember 5 student's names and I will fall on my face. I maintained a 4.0 in college without taking notes (it was actually harmful for me to take notes, as I wouldn't pay good enough attention).

I also have a problem with spelling and other languages. I genuinely struggled while taking 3 years of Spanish.

[Cygnus]

Originally Posted by Cerebrate To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

Do you have a good memory? How good are you with details(concrete)? How good are you at remembering a tasks or methods that should be executed in a sequential manner (methodical tasks)? To those who have answered the above, how good are you at Math (Advanced\University level Math) and how good are you at Accounting? what do you think of Accounting? Do you think your memory capacity or lack thereof has something to do with your psychological preferences as indicated by your mbti type? Looking forward to your replies.

"Ni" remembers what the fuck it wants...I tend to remember patterns with clarity, for instance I may not remember my password verbatim if asked, but staring at the keypad I will recall the pattern. I focus on concepts and remember those well, but can easily fuck up on the application details. The details regarding people and events tend to be tied to a greater understanding and the feelings of others and myself, for instance I will remember being upset with something and why, and as the years roll by I will still remember being upset and why, but forget the person's name...I also focus on and remember what is important to others, especially those I care about. I never forget my mother's birthday...ever, since it is so close to Christmas and her family...well let just say there is a lot of baggage and pain there and I'd never want to hurt her like that.

I do seem to have good spatial placement memory, meaning I can stumble around in the dark in a place I organized and I am familiar with and I know where things are and where I am.

So I guess my memory is "Ni' and "Fi" driven.

[rtjfq]

Our memory seems to depend on interest to a larger extent than in most other types. This got me into peculiar situations that maybe some of you can relate to:

- Freakishly good memory for things i get monomanic about for a while make people assume that i have very good cognitive skills overall, and then when i later fail to deliver because the topic doesn't interest me (anymore) they're confused and it's like i'm letting them down.

- People who know me a little longer will know this about me, so they'll very easily see when i'm really interested or not. There's really a lot of stuff out there i couldn't care less about, especially when i'm particularly focused on one single thing, but often i just try to be polite and feign interest. But then when they find out they feel betrayed (while i was just trying to be a nice guy).

- Sometimes i have no memory of things that happened just because i failed to register them in the first place (maybe this relates to the Sensing function as least developed cognitive skill). This typically happens during conversations with types that do not use communication primarily to convey information or find solutions but just want to ventilate personal emotions. Once i realize there's no point to the conversation (in the literal sense of me realizing that the person i'm talking to is not interested in achieving a certain solution or understanding of the issues raised) it's like my mind automatically switches off. Often i don't even realize this is happening; my mind just wanders off while my body is going through the motions (nodding, uhuh-ing,...) and it's only after a while that i notice i'm not paying attention and i better start paying attention again or the person will think bad of me. But usually it's already too late and they see in my eyes that i don't have a clue what they're saying.


In all, this kind of memory is extremely helpful in allowing me to professionally "rise to the occasion" (exam, presentation, job interview,...) but socially it gets me in embarrassing situations.

[dvdhrns]

My memory is a bit strange. Sometimes I wonder if I'm starting in with Alzheimer's as I simply don't remember complete conversations. (I'm 40). And conversely I often remember any and every specific detail about certain things and will remember with crystal clarity for decades. I recall these things with confidence. I suppose the things I forget were simply not that important to me initially and my mind jettisoned them.

Regarding math - it was always one of my strongest subjects. I did poorly my senior year of high school in Calculus because I was too stubborn to tell my parents that I couldn't read the board. Even though I was a music major in college and didn't need it, I retook Calculus / Statistical Analysis just to prove that I could do it. I got A's.

[dangerousdavid]

Mine is great as to details and things that interest me. However, I have trouble remembering someone's name 5 minutes after meeting them. I am great at trivia.

---------- Post added 12-16-2012 at 10:49 PM ----------

	Originally Posted by Zsych To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	My mind seems to be organized for utility. Information pops up when its needed.

+1