Percentage of newly learned material that is forgotten immediately : 56%
Amount that is forgotten within a day : 66%
Amount that is forgotten within a month : 80%
(according to 19th century German psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus, who developed what is now known as the Ebbinghaus Curve of Forgetting. (Seattle Times, 7/7/00))
Percentage by which chewing gum reportedly improves memory : 35%
(Though researchers aren't sure why, test groups that chewed gum recalled more and performed better on exams than control groups that didn't chew gum. One theory is that chewing releases insulin, a natural chemical that stimulates the part of the brain related to memory. (Washington Times, 3/15/02))
Average amount of memorization ability lost after age 55 : 1/10 of a word per year
(The results were gleaned from a test group of people over 55 who were given a list of 20 words to memorize. As the subjects aged over 16 years, they exhibited an average memory loss rate of about 1/10 of a word per year (Boston Globe (12/22/03))
LENGTH OF SCHOOL YEAR IN VARIOUS NATIONS:
China : 251 days
Japan : 243 days
Germany : 226 days
Italy : 216 days
England : 196 days
Canada : 180 days
(The extended summer recess prevalent in North America is a remnant of a time when children were needed to work on the family farm. Most other developed nations abandoned this outdated model years ago. (Harvard Business Review, 10/03; Cox News Service, 8/6/04))
