What is Sense Memory?
The term “sense memory” is used in two very different ways. In the first way, it involves the interaction of the senses and the memory, and the ways in which certain sensory stimuli can trigger memories. People may also evoke the concept of sense memory in the context of an acting technique known as affective memory, in which actors attempt to use their senses to put themselves into the mindset of their characters. Researchers who work with memory have learned that the five senses can play a very significant role in the process of making, storing, and retrieving memories. Smell in particular is very evocative, as the olfactory bulb is located right next to the part of the brain that handles memory storage, so people tend to create strong links between smells and particular memories. Many people have strong associations with a huge variety of smells, ranging from “my grandmother’s house” to “that one really good meal,” and smell is sometimes used in marketing to recall such memories and
