Let us see how learning is actually done, as indicated by laboratory experiments. The psychologist experiments a great deal with the memorizing of nonsense material, because the process can be better observed here, from the beginning, than when sensible material is learned. Suppose a list of twenty one-place numbers is to be studied till it can be recited straight through. The learner may go at it simply by "doing", which means here by reading the list again and again, in the hope that it will finally stick. This pure rote learning will perhaps do the job, but it is slow and inefficient. Usually the learner goes to work in quite a different way. He observes various facts about the list. He notices what numbers occur at the beginning and end, and perhaps in other definite positions. He may group the digits into two-place or three-place numbers, and notice the characteristics of these. Any familiar combinations that [{334}] may occur, such as 1492, he is likely to spy and remember. Lacking these, he can at least find similar and contrasting number-groups.
For example, the list
5 7 4 0 6 2 7 3 5 1 4 0 9 2 8 6 3 8 0 1,
which at first sight seemed rather bare of anything characteristic, was analyzed in a way partly indicated by the commas and semicolons,
5, 74, 0; 62, 73; 5140; 9, 286; 380, 1,
and memorized easily. These observed facts transformed the list from a shapeless mass into something having definite characteristics, and the observed characteristics stuck in mind and held the rest together.
Lists of nonsense syllables, such as
wok pam zut bip seg ron taz vis lab mer koj yad
are apt to be learned largely by observation of similarities and contrasts, by reading meanings into the syllables, and by grouping into pairs and reading rhythmically. Grouping reduces the twelve syllables to six two-syllabled nonsense words, some of which may suggest meaningful words or at least have a swing that makes them easy to remember. Perhaps the first syllable of every pair is accented, and a pause introduced after each pair; such devices assist memorizing.
The rhythmical and other groups that are found or made by the learner in memorizing nonsense lists are, in effect, "higher units", and have much the same value as the higher units of telegraphy or typewriting. One who learns many lists in the course of a laboratory experiment develops a [{335}] regular system of grouping. First he reads the list through, in groups of two, three or four items, noticing each group as a whole; later, he notices the items in each group and how they are related to each other. He also notices the interrelations of different groups, and the position of each group in the total series. All this is quite different from a mere droning along through the items of the list; it is much more active, and much more observant.