Effects of the mnemonic medium on reader memory

• What is the causal impact of the mnemonic medium’s review sessions on reader retention?
  • Quantum Country readers reliably develop detailed retention for embedded questions
• How efficiently can the mnemonic medium deliver reliable retention?
  • Mnemonic essays may offer detailed retention of their contents in exchange for 35-50% reading time overhead
  • Quantum Country readers get faster with each repetition
  • QCVC questions are initially forgotten at very different rates
• To what extent do these results generalize?
  • How does the mnemonic medium’s performance vary across different platform knowledge topics?
  • How might the mnemonic medium enable readers in genres outside platform knowledge?

The story I’d like to be able to tell:

1. If you complete the review sessions, you’ll remember what you read reliably.
2. … and you would remember much less without those review sessions.
3. … and it won’t cost you that much time.
4. … and this effect generalizes to many domains.

Within Quantum Country, we have strong evidence of 1, moderate evidence of 3, and emerging evidence of 2. We have no evidence of 4 yet.

But see also: What’s the big-picture impact of the mnemonic medium on readers?

Quantum Country user behavior

• In 2019H1, 29% of QCVC readers who finished the in-text level finished the 1 month level
• As of 2020Q1, several hundred users have demonstrated 1+ month of retention for QCVC

Reader perceptions

• “I’ve only done your first quantum country course (so far) but I find it remarkable that I can view the proof and follow it, knowing what everything means. It’s almost like Neo in The Matrix telling Morpheus, ‘I know quantum computing’” source
• “Doing the review sessions gives me what it promises to do, I guess. It is the confidence that I will remember the material and will be able to juggle the facts effortlessly. Although I already had a little prior experience with quantum computing, I benefited from the essays a lot. It went smooth and solidified my knowledge which was previously quite shaky and had too much white spots before. I’m very grateful for this mnemonic essays experiment existence.” — Dmitry Urbanovich Re: Hello from Quantum Country!
• “Unlike other ways to learn, I am not worried about forgetting what I

learned in the future, because I know there’s someone who will always
remind me to review the key parts at the right time points. And it’s
not just a feeling. According to the result of reviewing, I think I do
have memorized most of them reliably.” — Kevin