Why Do I Forget What I Read? 7 Questions, Answered

We finish a good book or a long talk, and a week later we can't say much more than "it was good." Months later, when we're writing something and the idea would finally help, it's gone. We do this too.

Why do I forget what I read right after reading it?

Because after reading we rarely go back to the idea, and memory drops fastest soon after we take something in. Hermann Ebbinghaus showed this steep early drop in the 1880s by testing his own memory of nonsense syllables; it's now called the forgetting curve. An idea we never recall or put in our own words gets no help against that drop.

Is it normal to forget most of a book? Was reading it a waste?

It's normal, and it wasn't a waste. Memory keeps what we come back to and lets the rest fade, and careful readers forget too. Ebbinghaus also found that forgotten material is quicker to learn the second time, which he called savings, so the book left more behind than it seems.

I forget what I read instantly. What can I do right after reading?

Before you close the book, the tab or the video, write one or two sentences in your own words: the idea you want to keep and where you might use it. A few days later, try to recall it before you look. In a well-known 2006 study, students who practiced recalling a text remembered more of it a week later than students who reread it (Roediger and Karpicke).

Can I remember what I read without taking notes?

Partly. Explaining an idea to a friend or using it in something you do that week helps it stay, because both make you recall it. What you can't do without a note is come back to the idea months later, once it has faded.

How should I take notes on books I read?

Write your own reaction: the idea you want to keep, why it matters to you, or where you disagree with the author. The book already holds the chapter, so there's no need to copy it out. Keep each note with the book it came from, so the context is there later.

I remember reading something but can't find where. How do I find it?

Search with any words you still remember, and if you kept notes, search those first, since your own words are easier to match than the author's. In Linko, search also looks for notes with the same meaning when no words match, and Ask Linko answers from your notes and shows which ones it used. If you never wrote anything down, you may have to search the web and reread.

Is there an app that helps you remember what you read?

Yes. In Linko, you save an article, video or book and write a line on it; months later, when you start a new note on the same idea in Linko on the web, that line shows up beside it as a related note, so you don't have to remember where you read it. Daily review also brings back one set of your notes each day. Each card is a question Linko made from a note; a note without one asks whether you remember it. Both work best with notes in your own words, so the one line after reading is worth the minute it takes.

For the full habit, step by step, see How to Remember What You Read (and Watch).