A few years ago, I lost my passport two days before a big international trip. Getting a new passport expedited would cost hundreds of dollars. And I wasn’t even sure it would arrive in time.

You can imagine how stressed I was. The last time I saw my passport was on my bed. I turned around my room to try to find her, to no avail.

I ended up taking a day off to look for that passport. That’s how serious I was in my search. But my search seemed completely random. I felt like I didn’t have the skills to strategically research it.

This experience made me think: there has be a more methodical way of proceeding. To find out, I asked visual search researchers, a metal detecting enthusiast, and a detective about the science and art of finding lost items.

Here are five helpful techniques for finding missing items, whether it’s something sentimental, like a class ring, or something precious, like an envelope full of cash. I hope they help you find what you are looking for.

Expert Strategies for Finding Missing Items

Technique 1: Identify what sets your missing item apart from its surroundings.

This could be its size, color, texture or shape. Then search based on this unique feature. This will make the process faster and more efficient, says Arryn Robbinscognitive psychologist from the University of Richmond specializing in visual search. Instead of looking at everything in a space, this approach helps you focus your attention only on objects with that distinction.

Robbins recently used this tactic when she lost the back of a rose gold earring on a rug of a similar color. So she changed her visual strategy to focus on everything that shines and reflects. “As soon as I thought about it, I saw it almost instantly,” she says.

Technique 2: Think of likely scenarios for how and why your item might have gotten lost in the first place – and where it might be.

It’s like this Demian Garciaa metal detecting enthusiast based in Northern California, helps clients find their missing jewelry in difficult locations like parks, beaches, and roadways.

Before even turning on his metal detector, he begins his search by asking his customers basic questions. “Do you have any places you normally put it?” Where have you lost it before? he said.

If you lost your class ring, for example, look where you usually put it: the bedside table, your jewelry box, the bathroom counter. If you’ve ever lost your ring in the car – because you played with it while driving – check that too.

Next, think about the specific situations that might have caused you to lose your item in the first place. Garcia describes the typical ways people lose their rings. “Did you throw anything away that day?” Were you dealing with cold water? Did you put lotion anywhere? These questions can help you develop a more focused strategy for where to look.

Technique 3: Recreate the movement of the object around the area you first remember losing it.

Allie Sullberg / For NPR

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For NPR

The behavior of how the object falls, lands, or moves as you play the scene can provide clues as to where the object might be. Garcia uses this tactic when clients lose a ring because they threw it out a window or across a room – usually during an argument.

Garcia remembers helping a woman who had thrown her wedding ring out the passenger window of the car. “She went on to say, ‘I threw it right there,'” he said.

He wondered: was it really “right there”? To test the theory, he took a cheap ring, tied a long red ribbon to it and asked the woman to throw it out the window like she had done with her wedding ring. “She threw it three times in a row and it never came straight out the window. He came back behind the car,” he said. Thanks to this technique, he was able to find the woman’s ring.

Technique 4: Break out of your research routine by changing your perspective.

Professional searchers, like search and rescue responders, don’t just look at the ground when searching for missing people in the wild, says Michael Houtcognitive psychologist and director of the Vision and Memory Sciences Laboratory at New Mexico State University.

They scan their environment 360 degrees. It means “looking down, looking up, looking left and right, crouching to change perspective, turning around to see things that were not visible to you when you first approached them” , explains Hout.

You might be surprised by what you find. “A windbreaker that someone threw away when it was hot, for example, could have been blown away by the wind and thrown into a bush or a tree, for example,” he says.

Technique 5: Look in strange and unexpected areas.

If you can’t find your keys in the places you usually leave them — your purse, your pocket, the entry table by the front door — “force yourself to look in low-probability areas “, explains Hout. “Sometimes people put their keys in weird places. Maybe they let them down. Or someone moved them.

Technique 6: Divide your space into sections, then research each section thoroughly.

Grid searching, as it’s called, is a form of systematic searching, Robbins explains. It is sometimes used in search and rescue as a last resort to find missing people. But it can also be a useful tool if you’re searching for something in a messy room, where the distinctive features of your missing item may be difficult to spot.

“It will be slow and less efficient, but it will ensure that you find what you are looking for,” says Robbins. “Imagine your research environment as a grid. Cover each square of the grid, perhaps top to bottom, left to right.

The idea is to develop a thorough search strategy without having to memorize all the places you’ve already looked, she explains. You don’t necessarily have to measure a grid. Just imagine dividing the search environment into smaller units (sections of a room, furniture), then search those units in an order that makes sense to you. If necessary, use Post-it Notes to mark where you have already looked.

How I finally found my missing passport

I spent hours searching and my brain was fried. I sat up on the bed and looked around the room. And then I just had this moment of clarity. The passport has be near the bed. That’s where I saw him for the last time.

So I pushed the mattress off the bed. And where did I find it? Stuck between the bed wall and the side of the mattress!

Even though I didn’t have any of the strategies I present to you now for searching for my passport, what I did have was persistence. This is what you will need if you want to successfully find your lost item.

I asked Darryl Ellis, head of A-1 Detective Agency in Illinois, what it takes to be a good detective. He has been a private detective since 1996.

“If I had to use one word, I would say tenacity,” he says. If you’ve lost something you really care about, keep going. Don’t give up.

We want to hear from you

Have any of these tips helped you find a missing item? Send us an email at [email protected] and we can feature your story on NPR or in the Life Kit newsletter.

This episode of Life Kit was produced by Margaret Cirino. It was edited by Margaret Cirino and Meghan Keane. The visual editor is Beck Harlan.

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