Sixteen Times - On Repetition

 I was watching videos by Bob Proctor and Zig Ziglar.  Both videos emphasized the need for repetition from different perspectives.  Repetitions, according to them, is vital for understanding contents of educational and motivational videos.

To back up his assertion, Bob Proctor uses simple but effective visuals to contrast a running speech or video with the attentional pattern of the listener.  He used white line to represent a running speech and a red line embedded in the white to represent the attentional pattern.  The red one usually has gaps as the listener tries to understand the running speech.  The effort forces the listener to drift out and think a little.  Meanwhile, the speaker does not pause; he is going.  The speaker often says something that the listener did not catch.  

In a way, this reminds me of that video showing basketball players passing the ball.  In that video, the viewer is instructed to count the number of passes.  At the end of the video, the presenter asks if the viewer saw a man in a gorilla suit that walked across the court; fifty percent of the viewers miss the gorilla.  I, being part of that fifty percent, can identify with what Bob Proctor is telling us.  

There are 'gorillas' we are missing while watching instructional videos.  The gaps in the red lines represent those 'gorillas'.

The effective remedy, according to Proctor, is repetition.  The blind spots or the gaps do not fall at exactly the same moments during each viewing of the video.  Hence, the more the repetition, the more complete our coverage of the material.

How many times do we need to repeat the videos?  Zig Ziglar, in a speech, says that we must watch a video sixteen times to understand it completely.  The count is not meant to be exact; it is there to emphasize the importance of repetition.  Ziglar also mentions that as we repeat, we are ingraining the message of what we are watching.

I am a fan of the power of repetitions; I thank these gentlemen for their encouraging perspectives on the power of repetition.  Their encouragement provides the endorphins as I watch and rewatch videos. It lets me power through thought provoking videos repeatedly.