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memory
Unfinished tasks linger in your memory much longer.
A classic 1927 study found that people remember interrupted tasks roughly twice as well as completed ones.
The observation of waiters forgetting orders after serving them was the anecdotal inspiration for the research, whereas the study itself evaluated laboratory subjects performing manual and mental tasks.
That nagging mental loop is just your brain holding onto a loop you haven't closed yet.
Where this comes from
- Study
- Bluma Zeigarnik, 1927, Psychologische Forschung
- What the check found
- The 1927 study did not test waiters; that was an anecdote/inspiration by her advisor Kurt Lewin. The actual study tested lab participants on tasks like puzzles and clay modeling.
- Confidence
- Well replicated
Related
One of these every day, and every one names the study it came from. When a finding is contested, it says so.