Psychology

Memory refers to the ability of an individual to recall or retrieve information already in store. One of the very common methods which have been used most commonly in school and learning includes aspects such as rehearsal through repetition of content over and over a period a long period of time. Therefore, repetition is defined as the act of repeating over and over an event for a number of times in order to master it clearly (Daniel, 2001).  For instance, if you are taught a new song today, you may not be able to grasp the verses or stanzas without having to sing over and over the stanzas so that you fix them in memory.

In human learning, there are several methods which can be applied in order to improve memory and recall of events from the long term memory. Repetition forms one of the basic methods used to improve memory in human learning.  The learning process in human minds is like the process of creating a path-way across a thicket forest (Morrow, 1999). The very first time you trod along the path, it is always very difficult to penetrate through because it is not yet clear and there are obstacles since you are not very conversant with the region. If left for a long time without use the path becomes overgrown and in future you might not even trace the path. That is how the human mind works.

Having learned a new skill it is important to practice through repetition of the steps involved in learning about the new skill in order to fix it and get it to the long term memory. It is believed that the human short -term memory is precisely short and is ability to recall and hold information in order to be stored in long term memory is short lived. Thus, the only way that a person can reinforce the process of information recording is through repeating over and over information severally until it is fixed in the long term memory (Daniel, 2001).

Evan Pavlov with his experience with dogs argued that repetition helps in the process of creating mental connections by establishing mental cues which trigger response over a selected action. Through repetition, it helps one to form associations such that when a particular stimuli strikes, the mind reacts by giving response. This can only be achieved through repetition. Repetition in learning is also seen as a very significant process. It enhances mastery and clarity of information such that the memory encodes each piece of information in its specific catalogue (Serena, 2006). Poor mastery of concepts leads to poor filing and cataloguing errors which again make the process of recall from memory slow and difficult.

Repetition is thus seen as an important process in language acquisition and mastery of concepts, attitudes and skills in language achievement which is also of necessity in the learning process. Repetition as a process therefore is significant in defining the nature of the storage strength and retrieval strength in the process of learning (Thodeck  Mathews, 2005). Retrieval strength is defined by ones ability to recall and drawback an item from memory right away. Repetition of information over and over a given period of time helps to increase retrieval strength and even improve the storage efficiency.