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Neuropsychologists have long wrestled with the nature of memory, but we still have far more questions than answers. What we do know is that, when it comes to retrieving long-term memories, much of what we regard as fact (“I did such-and-so”) is far from it. The world we craft from memory resides inside our minds, and it often fails to accurately depict the external realm of factual happenings.
As we age, many of us worry about losing our memory, and for good reason. Persons who suffer memory disorders, ranging from dementia to amnesia, often struggle to maintain their sense of identity. Memories provide the essential scaffolding underpinning one’s self-definition. I am my life story, so remembering salient moments in my personal history is how I define me. But how much of that story is fact and how much fiction?
Long ago, I worked with a gentleman who, due to an accident, sustained neural damage that left him with anterograde amnesia. Translation? He could remember everything that happened before his accident but was incapable of forming new memories after it. Essentially, this man was frozen in time. His mother died a month after he became amnesic, but, unless repeatedly reminded of that sad fact, he believed her to be alive. While his sense of self remained, it was limited to who he was before his accident. In kind, many who suffer from dementia or Alzheimer’s experience an even more profound erosion of their identity and the personality traits accompanying it.
Can We Fool Ourselves?
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Another hotly debated question related to memory is accuracy. Can we fool ourselves into recalling happenings that did not, in fact, occur? The answer is yes, at least in particular circumstances. In experiments, psychologists have induced false memories in their subjects, either through direct suggestion or simply by their line of questioning. Consequently, an increasing number of studies challenge the veracity of firsthand witness accounts in criminal proceedings, arguing that interactions with law enforcement sometimes plant false memories. Even mere repetition can persuade someone that a non-event took place. Suggest to a person enough times that they did such-and-so, even though they didn’t, and they may begin to buy it.
Similarly, when we recall something that did occur, how accurate are these recollections? Often, not very. In fact, there is strong evidence that one’s version of a past event is altered by repeatedly accessing the memory itself. This leads to both pruning (excluding important elements or actions) and embellishing (adding content that was not actually present). The mind is more of a story processor than an information processor, so recalling a memory is a storytelling activity, part fact and part fiction.
There is another issue involving memory seen in some who are victims of early life trauma. It’s called “dissociative amnesia.” As a mental defense mechanism, the young brain subconsciously forgets the traumatic event. It is simply unprepared to otherwise cope. This kind of deeply repressed memory sometimes resurfaces during psychotherapy. So, can these memories be trusted? Did these awful things really happen? In contrast to other forms of remembering, recall of a once-repressed traumatic event is generally regarded as reliable. Recent brain studies have strengthened this belief, although the debate continues.
Mental Signatures
Why are these memories more accurate? Perhaps because early childhood trauma, being infused with intense emotionality, leaves a distinct “signature” in the limbic brain, that which is involved in emotional regulation. So, even when conscious recall of the specific events surrounding a traumatic experience remains unavailable, the subcortical brain carries the wound of its emotional impact. Strong emotions are like a branding iron that imprints the event into one’s neurology.
While we laud the capacity for recall (“You have a great memory”), the ability to forget is also important. As we sleep, the subconscious mind sorts through the day’s events, discarding most recollections but retaining those few deemed important. The brain has incredible but not limitless storage capacity, so it must prune. Forgetting and remembering work in tandem.
All these processes, and others, illuminate memory’s vital role in shaping and maintaining one’s sense of self. Irish author Jon Banville alluded to this essential capacity in writing, “The past beats inside me like a second heart.” And it is that second heart that sustain one’s sense of “me.”
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