“Time is the thief of memory,” wrote Stephen King in one of his many books. For some people, however, that is not true. They are gifted with what scientists call highly superior autobiographical memory…
Sunanda Creagh, The Conversation and Michelle See-Tho, The Conversation
Certain types of long term memories can be “rewritten” without drugs or surgery, according to a new study that experts say offers hope for sufferers of post traumatic stress disorder. The study, conducted…
Memories, we know, are fallible, and in the case of acts such as this week’s horrific bombings in Boston, this presents particular problems. How can those charged with gathering eyewitness accounts – and…
It may seem somewhat intuitive, but learning through observation is one of the most potent ways humans learn a new skill. We see someone moving in a certain way and we copy it. But what happens when the…
Jee Hyun Kim, Florey Institute of Neuroscience and Mental Health
If you could erase your memories, which ones would you choose? As a neuroscientist, one of my raisons d’etre is to achieve, in a way, some form of memory erasure, especially for individuals that suffer…
Have you ever experienced a sudden feeling of familiarity while in a completely new place? Or the feeling you’ve had the exact same conversation with someone before? This feeling of familiarity is, of…
We humans use our large brains to make and store maps of our environment; maps we then use everyday for getting around and for recalling where we’ve been. But we are nothing special – many other animals…
Memories influence our behaviour for better or worse. A traumatic incident, experienced once, can darken our lives for ever more. Drug or alcohol addiction – driven by remembered rewards – can render the…
Jee Hyun Kim, Florey Institute of Neuroscience and Mental Health
If memory can be defined as “a past that becomes a part of me”, can forgetting be defined as “a past that is no longer a part of me”? Smokers who have abstained for years may not consciously be able to…
Jee Hyun Kim, Florey Institute of Neuroscience and Mental Health
Memory is difficult to define without being circular. People often define memory as “something you can remember”. But we cannot deny the existence of a memory when there is no recollection. Sigmund Freud…