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This has nothing to do with short term memory. You only get one new word per day. You get to add it to the earlier words and spend hours practicing the new phrase, writing it out, etc. Then you go in the next day, recite it, get a new word to add on. [Edit: re-reading the original post, maybe you don't get to write it down, but that's ok].
Do you know your own phone number, license plate, birthdate, address, SSN, credit card number, and so on? Some subset of the same basic info about your friends and family? It's all pretty random and comes to about the same thing.
I do think people rely on computers and smart phones more instead of remembering stuff. I'm old, went to school before everyone had mobile phones and computers, you had a land phone at home and it didn't store any numbers-you had to manually dial them. So you used the phone a lot more for stuff that you'd text or email today, and you'd manually dial the number. After you dial someone's number a few times you'd remember it. So you probably knew a few dozen phone numbers by memory. At best similar to a comparable number of words.
Also, maybe more people are having trouble. Microplastics? Covid? Who knows. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-09-sharp-memory-problems-adults.html
It has everything to do with short term memory. These words wouldn’t be getting committed to long term memory lol
I also grew up before mobile phones and the internet.
Of course they are going to long term memory. You have to repeat them the next day, remember?
That’s not long term memory lol
I think you're using an unusual concept of the term. I give you 5 words with an offer of $1K if you can repeat them to me tomorrow, so you put some effort into memorizing them for that. You're telling me that's short term memory? I don't think so.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short-term_memory
"For example, short-term memory holds a phone number that has just been recited. The duration of short-term memory (absent rehearsal or active maintenance) is estimated to be on the order of seconds."