Take the 2-minute tour ×  I'm doing a study on why it is
difficult to remember passwords. I would imagine that it would
be easier for people to remember a password like
"strawberryhouse" than "$tr@wb3rr!", even though the former has
more characters.  Is there any research that backs up that idea?
share|improve this question Compulsory XKCD reference –  nico
Feb 14 '12 at 19:09 add comment  2 Answers  up vote 9 down vote
accepted  One basic explanation would be a chunking one -- that
it's easier to combine several words into a single memory unit
than letters and numbers. In 2000, Alan Baddeley proposed the
episodic buffer as an important component of the working memory
(WM) system. According to Baddeley, the episodic buffer imbues
WM with the ability to join information together, even when that
information is of different modalities (e.g., sight and sound).
Even though "$tr@wb3rr!" may be as memorable as the word
"strawberry," with enough practice "strawberryhouse" can be just
as facile (and a stronger passwo