The 7±2 Rule and the Ladder of Abstraction
One of the key problems in communication is that everyone has a different interpretation of reality. As well, we often expect people to know exactly what we mean – even when we ourselves don't know!
NLP offers some tools to help us understand exactly what information we're communicating so that we can send the right content to others. The most basic principle is the 7±2 rule which comes from a study done by psychologist George Miller. Miller found that we can hold five to nine chunks of information (in other words, seven plus or minus two) in our short term memory. Now, what constitutes a chunk or piece of information? Well, there is no real answer. It depends on the information and how familiar you are with the topic. What is important to remember is that the more you can relate pieces of information to each other, the more people will remember.