My first reaction is surprise that the number of recalled items is so small. I naively assumed that most people constantly multi-task, that is, they continually receive and respond to multiple stimuli. Furthermore, they almost simultaneously are able to listen, read, write, and speak.
A deeper read of the article has convinced me that the stimuli which I interpreted as singular are in fact grouped as chunks. Instead of recalling ten or more individual bits, people are instead recalling a far smaller number of chunks.