Psychology says people who keep printed photos in drawers aren't resisting technology. For them, concrete visual cues can anchor autobiographical recall

In many homes, the practice of keeping photographs inside drawers, envelopes, and boxes continues despite the fact that most of these images are now stored either on a phone or in digital cloud services. Initially, this process may seem antiquated since digital photo collections contain thousands of pictures, are much more convenient to store, and can be instantly opened.

However, many individuals continue storing printed photos even though printing new pictures is seldom done nowadays. According to psychologists, the cause may not necessarily be an unwillingness to abandon traditional ways. Rather, it lies in the nature of human memory. The main idea behind the storage of printed photos is the potential of such photos to serve as strong triggers for recalling a certain memory.

According to research on autobiographical memories, visual prompts can help individuals recall their memories in better details. Moreover, sometimes the picture itself becomes a way of bridging the present and the past.


A photo is used as a memory cue

The study that proved this point the most clearly involved older adults and people suffering from Alzheimer's disease. As found in the scientific journal Memory, when pictures are involved in memory exercises, individuals remember more of their autobiographic experiences than without any pictures included. As reported, photographs work well for memories since they are “perceptually rich cues.” The images contain details which help the brain find the information within its memory banks.

This is crucial for the reason that memories are not necessarily brought out by a simple thought process. Often, the brain needs cues related to the actual events themselves. Images from birthday parties, vacations, and family outings serve this purpose well. The image provides the memory system with something tangible to use as an anchor, according to the scientists. Rather than reconstructing the memory from bits and pieces of information, the brain is provided with a visual anchor that was originally experienced.

Physical/printed photos' advantage

Psychologists also stress the need for concreteness in retrieving memories. According to the review published in the journal Current Directions in Psychological Science, memories are retrieved more easily by specific, unique, and relevant cues.

Photographs on paper have the same characteristics. They provide only one snapshot in time, in one place, with one visual composition. This is quite different from scrolling through hundreds of thumbnail-sized digital photos. Moreover, according to science, imageable and detailed cues lead to better autobiographical recollection. The fact that photographs have all the necessary visual elements eliminates the process of constructing the cue.

This might be the explanation for another common statement about the immediacy of old photographs. In mere seconds, a photograph helps a person remember facial expressions, lighting conditions, clothes, and even the whole background. All this information is impossible to reconstruct using only words.

The human brain reacts strongly to visual recollection

The phenomenon described above was long ago confirmed by psychologists. They referred to it as the “picture superiority effect.” In other words, people often find photographs easier to remember than written words. They often characterized such memories as having been more vivid and more emotional. It could also be due to the way photographs revive multiple levels of memory at once. They bring back memories of a location, a person, an emotion, and the sensory cues from the original event.

Another study examining multi-modal retrieval found that the nature of the cue makes a critical difference for the process of memory retrieval. Images, sounds, and objects can all have a significant impact by stimulating different kinds of memories, while visual stimuli tend to elicit particularly powerful reactions.

Why drawers of photographs survive the digital age

It is not as if photographs are not effective tools for saving our memories anymore. There is no denying that smartphones and digital album collections preserve our memories too. Yet psychologists believe that real photos have something else to contribute, which has nothing to do with their effectiveness but rather relates to their physicality.

For instance, a photograph can always be touched and revisited. Autobiographical priming studies have shown that things and images in our environment keep reminding us about personal events through constant exposure. This can shed light on why people keep storing their photographs in their drawers rather than deleting them from their hard drives after they are scanned. There is more to it than just keeping the image stored on your device; there is something more significant than that.

In psychological language, this means that a photograph in print format means something else. It is a reminder of an event that can instantly be recalled by one's mind.