While the quotes from the article by Ben Richmond certainly come directly from the article, they are misleading and serve only to mislead. They do not accurately reflect the entire findings of the article, and they do not reflect the conclusions from the original article by Linda Henkel.
In the first place, the study conditions were flawed, in that subjects were taken through a museum and asked to “take note” by either photographing an object or simply observing it.
In other words, the subjects were asked to either focus on observation or focus on photography.
The results from this study were inevitable.
Richmond, however, continues to emphasize his personal anti-camera agenda with other misleading statements
In her article abstract, Henkel states:
However, when participants zoomed in to photograph a specific part of the object, their subsequent recognition and detail memory was not impaired, and, in fact, memory for features that were not zoomed in on was just as strong as memory for features that were zoomed in on.
Read how Richmond restates this sentence. He changes the meaning to suit his personal bias. (To his credit, Richmond does indicate his bias several times, including in his last paragraph where he states, “[This] isn’t the ‘cameras are ruining your brain’ hit piece of research I was sort of hoping for.”
Although I disagree with several aspects of Henkel’s original research design, her conclusions are well thought out. Read her abstract at http://pss.sagepub.com/content/early/2013/12/04/0956797613504438.abstract to find out her actual conclusions. I think you will find that the actual take home lesson from the article is: take LOTS of pictures, but review them when you get home, or something like that.
Peace,
rand
-------------------------------------------------
"If you want to make a memory, start by forgetting your camera. Two new studies published in Psychological Science found that people who took pictures of objects had more trouble remembering specific details about them, where they were situated, and even if they had seen them at all.
"When people rely on technology to remember for them—counting on the camera to record the event and thus not needing to attend to it fully themselves—it can have a negative impact on how well they remember their experiences..."
Whole article here:
http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/taking-photos-makes-your-memory-worse
Paladin brings up two things in my mind. The first is how flawed are many statistical studies by not making clear the actual structure of the study nor the questions asked in the study. The second is how reports of studies misrepresent the conclusions.
A better example of Henkel's study would ask museum visitors who are leaving the museum to answer some questions in a survey. And included in the survey would be questions concerning taking a photograph of some art work and questions about the work photographed. I admit that it is much harder to construct an unbiased study. Even the one I just described would be biased; to be unbiased, every visitor would have to answer the survey, not only the visitors who volunteer to take the survey.
Richmond's article based on Henkel's study takes a small part of the study and draws over-profound conclusions. Even the first comment after the article questions the article's statement.
I disagree with Rand's suggestion in his last comment. I feel that taking lots of pictures tends to gradually dull the visitor's mind; instead, take few shots of the works -- the ones giving you the most powerful emotions. That way, you get to know the work before you shoot.
-yoram
On Wed, Dec 11, 2013 at 9:37 AM, Paladin <ranflory@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
