The Doorway Effect Explained

Have you ever walked into a room and thought… “Why did I come in here?”

Like your brain just deleted the quest? That’s not you being forgetful — it’s

a real thing called the Doorway Effect. Psychologists found that when you walk through a doorway,

your brain marks it as the end of one event and the start of another. It’s like your mind

says: “New room, new mission.” The problem is… your old mission

was why you came in here in the first place. Your brain uses something called

event boundaries. When a “scene” changes — like moving from your kitchen to your bedroom —

your working memory gets partly cleared to make space for new information. That’s why walking