A crucial feature of Hitchcock's motifs is that, collectively, they serve to say a great deal about the ‘world’ Hitchcock creates through his films; in some cases illuminating areas which one feels would have surprised him. They may appear fragmentary, but they are, rather, part of a complex, a network of associations which only really emerges when the motifs are considered across the whole of Hitchcock's work. Although it would not be possible to illustrate diagrammatically all of the ways in which the motifs interrelate with one another, the two figures are intended to indicate the dominant patterning of the individual motifs across two basic grids: one dealing with locations; the other with characters.

The locations grid merely groups the motifs according to the sites where they are concentrated. Lowercase letters indicate that the motif also occurs at these places, but less frequently.

The characters grid attempts something more complicated: to indicate the ways in which (most of) the motifs serve to connect the key figures of hero, heroine, villain and the police in a variety of ways. Thus the police typically bring the hero and heroine together under ENDINGS AND THE POLICE. Under CONFINED SPACES there is a quite different dynamic around these three figures, but all three are nevertheless frequently involved in the workings of the motif. By contrast, the BED SCENE usually connects the characters of hero, heroine and villain in separate pairings, so the diagram should be read slightly differently: hero and heroine, hero and villain and heroine and villain are brought together under the motif. FOOD AND MEALS likewise involves all three of these key characters in a variety of combinations.

With other motifs, two of the key figures are privileged. Thus in ENTRY THROUGH A WINDOW, the hero is usually going into the heroine's bedroom. The HANDS motif is used to connect the hero and heroine much more than any other characters. VOYEURISM AND EXHIBITIONISM connect hero and heroine in a frequently complementary manner; Hitchcock's BLONDES in particular are a powerful source of attraction for the hero. KEYS serve to connect the heroine and the villain (villainess in UNDER CAPRICORN) more often than not.