tag:theconversation.com,2011:/id/topics/amnesia-25972/articlesAmnesia – The Conversation2023-11-20T17:32:15Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2169252023-11-20T17:32:15Z2023-11-20T17:32:15ZDevelopmental amnesia: the rare disorder that causes children to forget things they’ve just learned<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/559891/original/file-20231116-15-15jbk3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C5112%2C2858&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Developmental amnesia can affect children throughout their adult lives too.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/elementary-school-classroom-brilliant-caucasian-boy-1794555436?consentChanged=true">Gorodenkoff/ Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Even though it came out more than 20 years ago, many people still remember <a href="https://www.pixar.com/feature-films/finding-nemo">Finding Nemo</a> thanks to one of its beloved main characters: Dory. The blue fish is remembered not only for her happy-go-lucky personality but for the condition she has, which makes her forget things almost as soon as they’ve happened.</p>
<p>Viewers might have assumed Dory’s condition was the stuff of fantasy, crafted to spur the movie’s plot forward. What many may not realise is that Dory’s memory troubles are similar to a real but rare condition that affects children.</p>
<p>Developmental amnesia causes children to forget things almost as soon as they’ve happened. Like Dory, they are unable to recall previous conversations or events – even significant ones such as an exciting birthday party. </p>
<p>This condition can affect them throughout their adult lives too. However, research by myself and colleagues may have uncovered a new <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09602011.2023.2275825">way to support</a> these children and make the most of their memory.</p>
<p>Developmental amnesia is caused by a lack of oxygen reaching the brain. There are a number of reasons this could happen, including a traumatic birth where the baby becomes stuck in the birth canal, <a href="https://academic.oup.com/brain/article/123/3/499/348744?login=false">unable to breathe</a>. Respiratory failure and cardiac arrest after birth are other potential causes.</p>
<p>It’s long been known that a lack of oxygen can cause brain damage. But in the late 1990s, Faraneh Vargha-Khadem, a consultant neuropsychologist at Great Ormond Street Hospital in London, identified three teenagers who had been <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9219696/">struggling with memory difficulties</a> since they were little. All had suffered a lack of oxygen to the brain in early life, and MRI scans showed all had damage to their hippocampus – the brain’s memory hub.</p>
<p>Based on what Vargha-Khadem observed, she outlined three main characteristics of developmental amnesia. First, spatial memory problems, such as getting lost in familiar surroundings or forgetting where they’d left their belongings.</p>
<p>Second, temporal memory problems, including needing to be frequently reminded of regularly scheduled classes or activities. And third, episodic memory problems or being unable to remember events in their lives. </p>
<p>These memory problems are lifelong and can be very disabling – meaning the children will need support for the rest of their lives.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A digital drawing of the hippocampus within the brain." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/559888/original/file-20231116-18-feuw5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/559888/original/file-20231116-18-feuw5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559888/original/file-20231116-18-feuw5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559888/original/file-20231116-18-feuw5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559888/original/file-20231116-18-feuw5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559888/original/file-20231116-18-feuw5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559888/original/file-20231116-18-feuw5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Children with the condition have damage to their hippocampus.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-illustration/3d-rendered-medical-illustration-hippocampus-plain-2256118539">SciePro/ Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It’s not known how common developmental amnesia is. Like Dory from Finding Nemo, children with developmental amnesia have good language skills, motor skills and cognitive abilities. So, at first glance, they don’t appear to have a problem. </p>
<p>This means doctors can miss their memory problems and the children don’t get referred to a specialist. Some are also misdiagnosed with attentional problems instead. </p>
<h2>Memory help</h2>
<p>Unfortunately, it’s not possible to repair the hippocampus once its damaged. As such, treatments for developmental amnesia focus on supporting children to make the most of their abilities. </p>
<p>Despite this support, children with developmental amnesia are at a considerable disadvantage in school. If they ask a question in class, they’ll soon forget the answer. When they get home from school, they can’t remember what their lessons involved. </p>
<p>However, one remarkable feature of developmental amnesia is that <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0028393209000438">recognition memory</a> – the ability to recognise something that has been encountered before – is not impaired. </p>
<p>So, if you showed someone with developmental amnesia pictures of faces, then later gave them a memory test of those faces, they’d be able to identify the ones they’d seen before. </p>
<p>While they wouldn’t remember where they’d seen the faces, they’d be able to say a face feels familiar – and correctly judge they’d seen it previously. This shows us that some aspects of memory can still function well in children with this condition.</p>
<p>We wondered if the ability to recognise familiar things could be key to helping children with developmental amnesia learn. To <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09602011.2023.2275825">test this idea</a>, we set up a case study with eight-year-old “Patient H”. </p>
<p>Patient H watched four different educational videos six times each. After each watch, he was immediately given a memory test.</p>
<p>For half of the videos, he was asked open-ended questions such as: “Where did the Egyptian nomads live?” This sort of test is very difficult for children with developmental amnesia. Even though he’d watched each video six times, he performed very poorly in the test.</p>
<p>For the other videos, he was given a multiple-choice test. This allowed him to use his recognition memory to identify which of the answers felt familiar.</p>
<p>Patient H performed far better in this test, getting 18 out of 20 answers right, compared with only six out of 20 in the first test. In fact, he performed as well in the recognition test as children without developmental amnesia. </p>
<p>A week later, Patient H returned to the lab and was given another memory test based on the videos he’d previously watched. Remarkably, he was able to recall twice as much information from the videos he’d been tested on using multiple choice, compared with the first time he was tested – even when he was asked open-ended questions. Crucially, he wasn’t only able to recognise the information but could recall details.</p>
<h2>How new memories are formed</h2>
<p>Our conclusion was that multiple-choice tests allowed Patient H to use intact parts of his brain’s memory system to process and consolidate information. This helped him learn information more efficiently and build a stable memory.</p>
<p>This finding is encouraging, but further research is needed to understand if recognition memory can support learning in the classroom and over longer delays than one week. The fact that developmental amnesia is so rare makes it difficult to study and test interventions in larger groups of people. </p>
<p>We also need to do more work to understand the learning processes that occur in developmental amnesia, and how new memories are formed. Understanding this may help develop better learning techniques for people with the condition.</p>
<p>But these results are promising nonetheless, showing that multiple-choice tests may be an easy and helpful tool for children with developmental amnesia in forming stable memories and potentially keeping up in class.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/216925/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rachael Elward does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Our latest research may have found a way of helping children with this condition to learn.Rachael Elward, Senior Lecturer, Neuroscience and Neuropsychology, London South Bank UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1722802022-02-01T13:14:03Z2022-02-01T13:14:03ZSeizures can cause memory loss, and brain-mapping research suggests one reason why<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/443023/original/file-20220127-4399-lt0flk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C1732%2C1732&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">In addition to memory loss, seizures can result in a complete loss of consciousness.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/illustration/digital-artwork-of-human-mental-energy-royalty-free-illustration/1283557418">pressureUA/iStock via Getty Images Plus</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eplepsyres.2017.11.015">Epilepsy</a> is a disease marked by recurrent seizures, or sudden periods of abnormal, excessive or synchronous neuronal activity in the brain. <a href="https://www.epilepsy.com/make-difference/public-awareness/1-26#">One in 26 people</a> in the U.S. will develop epilepsy at some point in their life. While people with mild seizures might experience a brief loss of awareness and muscle twitches, more severe seizures could last for several minutes and lead to injury from falling down and losing control of their limbs. </p>
<p>Many people with epilepsy also experience memory problems. Patients often experience retrograde amnesia, where they cannot remember what happened immediately before their seizure. Electroconvulsive therapy, a form of treatment for major depression that intentionally triggers small seizures, can also <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jad.2011.02.026">cause retrograde amnesia</a>. </p>
<p>So why do seizures often cause memory loss?</p>
<p>We are <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=bjrXv58AAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">neurology</a> <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=nMb-pTcAAAAJ&hl=en">researchers</a> who study the mechanisms behind how seizures affect the brain. Our <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pneurobio.2020.101984">brain-mapping study</a> found that seizures affect the same circuits of the brain responsible for memory formation.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/LcO9YU-Pdws?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">One of the earliest descriptions of seizures was written on a Babylonian tablet over 3,000 years ago.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Why do seizures cause memory loss?</h2>
<p>Seizures can be caused by a number of factors, ranging from <a href="https://www.epilepsy.com/learn/epilepsy-due-specific-causes/structural-causes-epilepsy">abnormalities in brain structure</a> and <a href="https://www.epilepsy.com/learn/epilepsy-due-specific-causes/genetic-causes-epilepsy">genetic mutations</a> to <a href="http://scitechconnect.elsevier.com/connections-between-infections-seizures">infections</a> and <a href="https://rarediseases.info.nih.gov/diseases/11979/autoimmune-encephalitis">autoimmune conditions</a>. Often, the root cause of a seizure <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.4103%2Fjfmpc.jfmpc_322_16">isn’t known</a>.</p>
<p>The most common type of epilepsy involves seizures that originate in the brain region located behind the ears, the <a href="https://emedicine.medscape.com/article/1184509-overview">temporal lobe</a>. Some patients with temporal lobe epilepsy experience retrograde amnesia and are unable to recall events immediately before their seizure. </p>
<p>This may be because these seizures affect the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/0301-0082(91)90011-O">hippocampus</a>, a region in the temporal lobe important for memory storage and processing. During sleep, the hippocampus transmits new information learned during the day to another part of the brain called the cerebral cortex in order to consolidate it into new memories. This process occurs through many brain pathways connecting the hippocampus to the cortex. </p>
<p>With this in mind, our research group wondered if the electrical signals of seizures might also follow the same routes the brain uses for memory consolidation instead of creating their own separate path. We reasoned that disruption of this pathway might cause memory loss.</p>
<p>To figure this out, we trained mice to navigate a T-shaped maze to find a reward of sweetened condensed milk. The mice had to learn how to alternate between the left and the right arm of maze in a specific pattern to be given milk. When the mice were able to obtain the milk 80% of the time, we determined that the mice had successfully consolidated their memory of how to navigate the maze.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/cL7H5Sxw1KM?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">T mazes are used to assess spatial learning and memory.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Fifteen minutes after the mice successfully learned how to navigate the maze, we injected them with a drug that causes seizures. The day following the seizure, we found that the mice performed poorly on the maze, as though they hadn’t learned how to navigate it in the first place. This confirmed that a single seizure was enough for the mice to forget what they learned just before the seizure. </p>
<p>Our next step was to figure out why seizures caused the mice to forget what they learned. To identify which parts of the brain were active during the learning process and during seizures, we used genetically engineered mice whose neurons produce a red protein when activated. We mapped the neurons of these mice as they were learning how to navigate the maze and during the induced seizures. In analyzing these maps, we found that learning and seizures activated the same brain circuits in the hippocampus and cortex. Because they use the same brain pathways, seizures can disrupt the memory consolidation process by taking over the circuit. This meant that seizures can hijack the memory pathways and cause amnesia.</p>
<p>Because memory is networked throughout the brain, memory impairments might not necessarily stem just from interference in the hippocampus alone. Future studies on other brain regions will further clarify how seizures cause memory loss.</p>
<p>[<em>Understand new developments in science, health and technology, each week.</em> <a href="https://memberservices.theconversation.com/newsletters/?nl=science&source=inline-science-understand">Subscribe to The Conversation’s science newsletter</a>.]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/172280/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jaideep Kapur receives funding from the NIH and the University of Virginia. He is the chair of the International League against Epilepsy North America, a member of the Board of Directors of the American Epilepsy Society, and a member of the Scientific Advisory Committee of the CURE Epilepsy Foundation.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Anastasia Brodovskaya does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Many people with epilepsy are unable to remember what happened immediately before they have a seizure. This may be because seizures and memory use the same pathways of the brain.Anastasia Brodovskaya, Postdoctoral Fellow in Neurology, University of VirginiaJaideep Kapur, Professor of Neuroscience and Neurology, University of VirginiaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1388402020-05-19T14:27:17Z2020-05-19T14:27:17ZColonial amnesia and Germany’s efforts to achieve ‘internal liberation’<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/336018/original/file-20200519-152292-nulqys.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Protesters in Berlin demand that the 1904-1908 mass killings in Namibia be recognised as the first genocide committed by Germany.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Supplied/Courtesy of Joachim Zeller</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Speaking at the 75th commemoration of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/08/european-leaders-mark-heroics-of-war-generation-after-75-years">VE (Victory in Europe) Day</a>, German president Frank-Walter Steinmeier <a href="https://www.bundespraesident.de/SharedDocs/Downloads/DE/Reden/2020/05/200508-75-Jahre-Ende-WKII-Englisch.pdf?__blob=publicationFile">said</a> it was a day of liberation “imposed from outside”, by Allied military forces, including the Soviets. But as he stated, “internal liberation”, the coming to terms with the heritage of dictatorship and above all the horrific mass crimes, remained “a long and painful process”.</p>
<p>In 1985 the West German head of state, Richard von Weizsäcker, for the first time used the term “liberation” for the <a href="https://www.bundespraesident.de/SharedDocs/Downloads/DE/Reden/2015/02/150202-RvW-Rede-8-Mai-1985-englisch.pdf?__blob=publicationFile">unconditional surrender of German troops</a> that marked the end of the second world war in Europe. This sparked considerable protest and controversy, a sign that even as late as the mid-1980s, Germany was having difficulty coming to terms with its past.</p>
<p>Steinmeier’s more consistent plea to “accept our historic responsibility” met broad consensus. “Internal liberation” had come some way – leaving aside comparatively weak statements by the <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/afd-what-you-need-to-know-about-germanys-far-right-party/a-37208199">right-wing Alternative für Deutschland</a>.</p>
<p>The culture of remembrance, concerning also dire aspects of the past, that’s been engendered in Germany is viewed by many as exemplary. But it nevertheless has some grave shortcomings. Notably, the remembrance of <a href="https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/auschwitz">Auschwitz</a> as a substantial part of German state rationale has come about through a halting and conflicting process. For all its merits, still, by virtually singling out the Shoah (the genocide of the Jews in Europe), it marginalises and disregards other mass crimes of the Nazi period. </p>
<p>As recalled during the VE-Day anniversary, such elision from memory includes over 30 million victims of the war against the Soviet Union and the occupation of eastern territories in what are today Russia, Ukraine, Belorussia, Moldavia, Poland and the Baltic states. This blank spot relates to an ingrained culture in Germany of discrimination against Slavic people and refuses to acknowledge the crimes perpetrated by the millions of <a href="https://www.neues-deutschland.de/artikel/1136440.ns-zeit-die-wehrmacht-warrs-auch.html?sstr=Hannes%7CHeer">ordinary German soldiers</a>.</p>
<p>Another glaring lacuna concerns Germany’s past as a colonial power. This period lasted from <a href="https://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/German_colonial_empire">1884 to 1919</a>. Despite the relatively short duration, this experience had a great impact on Germany’s violent trajectory during the first half of the 20th century. Since 1945, however, this history has been largely forgotten.</p>
<p>Today many Germans are not even aware that their country once ruled colonies in Africa, Oceania and China. Such public amnesia about <a href="https://www.rosalux.de/fileadmin/rls_uploads/pdfs/Standpunkte/Standpunkte_9-2018.pdf">Germany’s colonial past</a> does not imply only a lack of knowledge. Rather it manifests in the refusal to acknowledge the practice of German colonialism and countenance the consequences. </p>
<p>A prominent case is the <a href="https://theconversation.com/has-the-relationship-between-namibia-and-germany-sunk-to-a-new-low-121329">genocide of 1904-1908 in then South West Africa</a>. Germany admitted the fact in 2015. But bilateral negotiations with Namibia <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/14623528.2020.1750823">have not yet reached any result</a>.</p>
<h2>Selective amnesia</h2>
<p>Complacency about German culture of remembrance tends to isolate the Shoah as the mainstay of canonised public memory. There was a period when the entire field of comparative genocide studies was scrutinised as undermining the singularity of the Shoah. American political scientist and historian <a href="https://www.sciencespo.fr/mass-violence-war-massacre-resistance/fr/document/genocide-theory-search-knowledge-and-quest-meaning.html">Henry Huttenbach</a> pointed to the imbalance</p>
<blockquote>
<p>that the Holocaust became the paradigm for all genocides by default.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>This also eroded the vital call of “Never Again” by the survivors of the Buchenwald concentration camp <a href="https://www.blurb.com/b/828859-never-again-buchenwald">in 1945</a>. If comparison is tabooed, the Holocaust cannot stand as a warning that organised mass extinction might yet be repeated. </p>
<p>But, unfortunately, we have to stand guard against the very real possibility of current and future cases of genocide, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity.</p>
<p>The persistent lack of awareness was shown once again in a mid-2019 foreign ministry <a href="https://www.auswaertiges-amt.de/blob/2298392/633d49372b71cb6fafd36c1f064c102c/transitional-justice-data.pdf">position paper on transitional justice</a>. It “advocates a comprehensive understanding of confronting past injustices” and refers to “reparations and compensation for National Socialist injustices”. It suggests that</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Germany can provide information about basic requirements, problems and mechanisms for the development of state and civil-society reparation efforts.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Strikingly, however, the term “colonialism” does not feature even once in the 32 pages.</p>
<p>Rather, German diplomacy is seen as aggressively keeping things apart. This attitude is self-congratulatory and discriminating at one and the same time. </p>
<h2>Namibian genocide</h2>
<p>The issue was epitomised when Ruprecht Polenz, the German special envoy in the negotiations with the Namibian government about the consequences of the genocide, met a delegation of Namibian descendants of genocide survivors in 2016. They challenged him for not being part of the negotiations. They pointed out that Germany had negotiated with other non-state agencies, such as <a href="https://www.bpb.de/apuz/162883/wiedergutmachung-in-deutschland-19451990-ein-ueberblick?p=all">the Jewish Claims Conference</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/336022/original/file-20200519-152284-f31qfv.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/336022/original/file-20200519-152284-f31qfv.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336022/original/file-20200519-152284-f31qfv.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336022/original/file-20200519-152284-f31qfv.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336022/original/file-20200519-152284-f31qfv.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336022/original/file-20200519-152284-f31qfv.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336022/original/file-20200519-152284-f31qfv.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Graves of forced labourers from a concentration in Lüderitz, Namibia.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Reinhart Kössler</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Polenz stressed that it was inappropriate to draw comparisons in cases such as genocide. But at the same time he pointed out that the Holocaust was qualitatively different from the genocide in Namibia. The meeting exploded in protest by the Namibian delegates – and <a href="http://genocide-namibia.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/PRESS-RELEASE-NOV-2016.pdf">a walkout</a>. They saw disrespect in belittling what happened to their ancestors as well as discriminating against them as Africans.</p>
<p>Already in 2001, Namibia’s foreign minister, Theo-Ben Gurirab, commented at the <a href="https://nhri.ohchr.org/EN/Themes/Racial/Pages/2001-World-Conference-Against-Racism.aspx">World Conference Against Racism</a> on the lack of a German apology to Namibians in contradistinction to Europeans. He concluded that if there was a problem in apologising because Namibians were black, <a href="http://www.freiburg-postkolonial.de/Seiten/melber-reconciliation2006.htm">that would be racist</a>.</p>
<h2>The challenges of ‘internal liberation’</h2>
<p>German memory politics and practices are not quite as exemplary as the Foreign Office would like to make us believe. In fact, the engagement with the violent past particularly of the first half of the 20th century is an ongoing and painful as well as conflictual process. Inasmuch as this process has been seen to consecutively encompass crimes and victim groups that had been silenced before, such an observation can only underline the magnitude of the task.</p>
<p>The urgency of addressing such challenge emerges from revisionist efforts, spearheaded by the Alternative für Deutschland. The group’s honorary chairman, Alexander Gauland, infamously termed Nazi rule as “bird’s shit” in comparison to <a href="https://www.afdbundestag.de/wortlaut-der-umstrittenen-passage-der-rede-von-alexander-gauland/">Germany’s “successful” history</a>.</p>
<p>The party has drawn up a parliamentary draft resolution calling for a positive reassessment of <a href="https://dipbt.bundestag.de/dip21/btd/19/157/1915784.pdf">colonialism’s modernising achievements</a>. It makes explicit reference to a 2018 statement by the personal representative of the <a href="https://africasacountry.com/2019/01/a-technocratic-reformulation-of-colonialism">German Chancellor for Africa</a>. He maintained that German colonialism contributed to liberate the African continent from archaic structures.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/surviving-genocide-a-voice-from-colonial-namibia-at-the-turn-of-the-last-century-130546">Surviving genocide: a voice from colonial Namibia at the turn of the last century</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>These developments show that there are limits to Germany’s accomplishment of coming to terms with its violent past. This was also reflected in the vigorous objection by German officials to <a href="https://wiser.wits.ac.za/users/achille-mbembe">Achille Mbembe</a>, the Cameroonian philosopher and political theorist, being invited as keynote speaker at this year’s Ruhrtriennale, a renowned cultural festival. He had been asked to address the issue of <a href="https://presse.ruhrtriennale.de/pressreleases/ruhrtriennale-2020-beschliesst-die-zwischenzeit-mit-internationalem-programm-2983369">“Reparation”</a>.</p>
<p>A deputy of the Liberal Party in the <a href="https://fdp.fraktion.nrw/sites/default/files/uploads/2020/03/25/offenerbrieflorenzdeutschanstefaniecarpwegenachillembembe-ruhrtriennale2020.pdf">North Rhine Westphalia Diet</a> alleged that Mbembe had refuted Israel’s right to exist as a state, and had “relativised” the Holocaust by comparing the practices of separation under apartheid with the Palestinian situation. The federal government’s antisemitism commissioner <a href="https://www.jpost.com/diaspora/antisemitism/german-antisemitism-commissioner-rejects-bds-academic-at-festival-624577">joined this
protest</a>.</p>
<p>This intervention sparked a controversy that stands as a warning that the postcolonial situation of Germany is very much at stake. By reducing the conflict to issues of antisemitism, it has been trapped in the pitfalls of colonial amnesia. But inner liberation remains hard work. It means conflict and pain, and it must never end.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/138840/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Henning Melber has been a member of SWAPO since 1974.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Reinhart Kössler does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The culture of remembrance in Germany is viewed by many as exemplary. But it has some grave shortcomings.Henning Melber, Extraordinary Professor, Department of Political Sciences, University of PretoriaReinhart Kössler, Professor in Political Science, University of FreiburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/639032016-09-30T01:18:03Z2016-09-30T01:18:03ZThe curious origin of the double-conk theory for curing amnesia<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/139498/original/image-20160927-30419-n6mxpg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-93019000/stock-vector-head-bandage-vintage-engraved-illustration-manuel-des-hospitalire-et-des-garde-malaldes-edited-by-librairie-poussielgue-paris-1907.html?src=VVEj3_tBFYLcKRLVIV6m_w-3-62">Image of head bandage engraving via www.shutterstock.com.</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>You’re probably familiar with the TV or movie plot device where a character is conked on the head, loses memory or identity and then gets conked again and memory is restored. Classic examples are in the 1951 Tom and Jerry Cartoon <a href="http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2i35s0">Nit-Witty Kitty</a> and the movie “Clean Slate.”</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/uDdyuKdbCQ8?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Trailer for ‘Clean Slate,’ 1994.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This “double-conk” myth is so far off from neurological fact that it is laughable to scientists and physicians. It’s never a good idea to hit someone on the head as a cure for any type of concussion or brain injury. Yet surveys of the public find that around 40 percent believe that <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0887-6177(03)00025-8">a second blow to the head</a> can help someone recover forgotten memories.</p>
<p>I’m a clinical neuropsychologist and I study memory and memory disorders. In the classroom, I use movies to demonstrate how brain science and neuro-myths are depicted in popular film. Amnesia is a popular theme. In fact, there have been <a href="http://www.neuropsyfi.com/movies.html">more amnesia movies made</a> than for any other type of neurological disorder and many of them depict the myth of the “double-conk.” </p>
<p>So I wanted to find where this idea first came from. Did it just emerge from the mind of a creative Hollywood writer or filmmaker? I was surprised to find the origins of this particular myth <a href="http://www.neurology.org/content/86/24/2291.abstract">go back to the early 19th century</a>. </p>
<h2>Back to the early 19th century</h2>
<p>I went through troves of old movies and books, tracing the myth back to the silent movies of the early 20th century and late 19th-century fiction, including novels published in serialized form in newspapers.</p>
<p>In my research I also uncovered what I would call “pop psychology” newspaper stories about memory, many of which are wildly inaccurate, but reflected what was being written for the public. Then I tried to align the emergence of the double-conk story theme with both scientific and popular writings about brain and memory functioning from the 19th century. </p>
<p>To my surprise, I found what I believe may be the first “scientific” endorsement of a “double-conk” cure in the writings of French physician Francois Xavier Bichat, published after his death in 1802. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/138887/original/image-20160922-25473-2qmr2q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/138887/original/image-20160922-25473-2qmr2q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=795&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138887/original/image-20160922-25473-2qmr2q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=795&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138887/original/image-20160922-25473-2qmr2q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=795&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138887/original/image-20160922-25473-2qmr2q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=998&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138887/original/image-20160922-25473-2qmr2q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=998&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138887/original/image-20160922-25473-2qmr2q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=998&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Portrait of Francois Xavier Bichat.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3APortrait_of_Marie_Francois_Xavier_Bichat_(1771-1802)_Wellcome_L0011401.jpg">Wellcome Images, via Wikimedia Commons</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Bichat was a young up-and-coming anatomist who believed that the two brain hemispheres were identical in structure and function. In a healthy brain, he reasoned, the hemispheres are in balance with each other and therefore in symmetry. Therefore, if a person is hit on one side of the head, the brain can lose balance, causing confusion or mental derangement. </p>
<p>The cure, in Bichat’s opinion, was a blow to other side. He wrote that “observations so frequently repeated of an accidental blow upon one side of the head having restored the intellectual functions, which had long remained dormant in consequence of a blow received upon the other side.” </p>
<p>My suspicion is that Bichat’s endorsement of a double-conk cure is based on folklore idea because he doesn’t cite or explain any individual cases to support his claim, while implying that a second blow restoring function is a common occurrence. He then uses this example, without question, to support his ideas of brain symmetry and balance. </p>
<h2>Bichat’s idea fit prevailing views of brain injury</h2>
<p>To a modern scientist, it’s easy to wonder why anyone would think a double-conk cure is reasonable. We now know that hitting the brain, or even shaking it, can cause temporary or permanent structural damage to neurons. </p>
<p>But, in the early 19th century the thinking was that concussion, or any brain injury, did not cause permanent structural or neuronal damage but a general “commotion” or “derangement” of the brain. It was generally thought that concussions, or any imbalance in the brain, could cause problems in thinking and memory, and could also lead to insanity. So Bichat’s proposal of brain symmetry and a second blow helping to “rearrange” the problems caused by a first blow fit into the prevailing view about concussions.</p>
<p>Later on Victorians also thought that any type of “nervous shock” caused a physical effect on the nervous system. Electricity could provide a nervous shock, as could terror, grief or a blow to the head. All physical or emotional shock was considered to have the same effect on the brain and nervous system.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/138884/original/image-20160922-25457-5v4bq9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/138884/original/image-20160922-25457-5v4bq9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=512&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138884/original/image-20160922-25457-5v4bq9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=512&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138884/original/image-20160922-25457-5v4bq9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=512&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138884/original/image-20160922-25457-5v4bq9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=643&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138884/original/image-20160922-25457-5v4bq9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=643&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138884/original/image-20160922-25457-5v4bq9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=643&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Victorians thought of the brain as a machine.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-147446807.html?src=download_history">Brain mechanism image via www.shutterstock.com.</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Many problems were thought to be the result of an unbalanced brain. Indeed, several early and mid-19th-century practitioners believed shocks, whether physical or emotional, could be useful to bring someone out of coma, or a stupor. Hysteria, a catch-all diagnosis often given to women for a wide variety of “nervous” symptoms, was sometimes treated by slapping the patient. </p>
<p>Considering that many Victorians saw the brain as a machine it may have appeared reasonable to them to “knock some sense” back into someone. A shock to the system would get the cogs moving again and bring the brain back in balance, like someone hitting a machine on the side to get it working again. </p>
<h2>What about amnesia?</h2>
<p>So how did all of this become connected to amnesia? While Bichat wrote only generally about “intellectual” problems, it had been known since ancient times that traumatic brain injury could cause memory problems. However, there was another prevailing myth circulating at the time that memories could never be lost. This was also was reinforced by “pop psychology” writers of the 19th century.</p>
<p>Many of us have had the experience of a “memory jog,” or a cue that brings up a long forgotten memory. Perhaps because our own experiences serve as powerful evidence to us, this also reinforces the myth that all memories are forever stored in the brain and only need some sort of jolt to come back.</p>
<p>It’s hard to know exactly how the double-conk myth became intertwined with the myth of memory restoration, but forgetting and amnesia were also popular themes in Victorian novels. If memory could be restored with a shock, a second conk could provide that jolt. </p>
<p>It wasn’t until the middle of the 19th century that a few scientists studying memory began to fully realize that a blow to the head might destroy some memory abilities completely. A second blow wasn’t likely to jump start the brain, they realized, but create further damage. </p>
<p>But the double-conk myth was already in circulation by then. The fact that the myth was originally supported by some scientists and physicians probably lent it some credence even as evidence that it wasn’t true mounted. It’s hard to change a myth with a 50-year head start.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/63903/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mary Spiers does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The myth that a blow to the head can both cause and cure amnesia – a common one on TV and in the movies – may have begun during the 19th century.Mary Spiers, Associate Professor of Psychology, Drexel UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/629342016-08-05T01:31:17Z2016-08-05T01:31:17ZWhat the Bourne films get right and wrong about amnesia<p>In 2002’s “The Bourne Identity,” our protagonist wakes up having been shot and plucked, unconscious, from the Mediterranean on to a fishing boat with no memory of who he is or how he got there. From there, the movie franchise follows Jason Bourne as he recovers memories of past events and rediscovers his identity. </p>
<p>But, although Bourne’s amnesia at the start of the first film in the series is profound (and profoundly important to the unfolding story), we quickly learn that there are some things Bourne does remember from his past. For example, how to speak multiple languages, how to drive and how to fight. All of these are complex motor tasks that he learned before he was shot and fell in to the water. </p>
<p>This aspect of Bourne’s amnesia is actually quite accurate. For people with “organic” amnesia (where neurological memory loss is typically due to damage to <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC497229/">the medial temporal lobes</a> in the brain), memory for skills and habits is intact, even though other memories are lost. There is truth to the cliché that you never forget how to ride a bicycle. </p>
<h2>Different memories are affected in different ways</h2>
<p>Memory investigators make a distinction between declarative memory and procedural memory. Amnesia affects these types of memories in different ways.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/132996/original/image-20160803-12192-69ut8h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/132996/original/image-20160803-12192-69ut8h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=747&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/132996/original/image-20160803-12192-69ut8h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=747&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/132996/original/image-20160803-12192-69ut8h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=747&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/132996/original/image-20160803-12192-69ut8h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=939&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/132996/original/image-20160803-12192-69ut8h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=939&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/132996/original/image-20160803-12192-69ut8h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=939&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Procedural memories, like how to ride a bike, can endure when someone has amnesia.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Woman on bike via www.shutterstock.com.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Declarative memory includes anything you can “declare” or talk about. For instance, remembering that Paris is the capital of France, or that you had cereal for breakfast today, or that you have to take your allergy medicine tomorrow morning. While these types of memories are different in other, important ways, you are able to think or talk about the content of the memory and have an explicit awareness that you are remembering in each example. It is these declarative memories that are most affected by amnesia.</p>
<p>Procedural memory, on the other hand, are motor “procedures” or skills that you demonstrate through behavior. For instance, remembering how to fry an egg, or how to type a word on a keyboard, or how to hit a golf ball, or how to brush your teeth. These are tasks that are learned over time, but that are difficult to describe in words or to articulate when or how mastery was achieved. </p>
<p>Real-world amnesiacs not only remember how to do things that they had learned prior to their injury or illness, but they are also able to learn new skills. Procedural memory isn’t affected in the same way that declarative memory is. </p>
<h2>The case of Henry Molaison</h2>
<p>In the 1960s, neuropsychologist Brenda Milner first demonstrated how patients who lose the ability to form declarative memories are still able to learn new skills with the famous amnesiac patient, Henry Molaison (<a href="https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/trouble-in-mind/201201/hm-the-man-no-memory">H.M.</a>).</p>
<p>H.M. lost his memory after surgeons removed his hippocampus, a brain structure associated with memory, in an attempt to treat his severe epilepsy. Of course, this sort of surgery would not happen today. Typically, amnesia is the result of <a href="http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/amnesia/basics/causes/con-20033182">brain injury or illness</a>. </p>
<p>H.M. was able to improve his performance on the difficult motor task of tracing a shape while being able to see only his hand and the shape reflected in a mirror. </p>
<p>Over a week of testing, H.M. made fewer and fewer mistakes on this mirror-tracing task, even though he never remembered ever having done the task before and had to have the goal explained to him each day. In other words, his declarative memory for the rules of the game and for experiencing it in the past was impaired, but his procedural memory for performing the task was spared. </p>
<p>H.M.’s inability to form new memories is characteristic of what is called anterograde amnesia. This form of amnesia is defined by the inability to form new declarative memories of facts, personal experiences or plans for the future subsequent to the injury or illness. This hallmark aspect of true memory loss is frequently absent from fictional amnesiacs, including Jason Bourne. </p>
<h2>Retrograde amnesia</h2>
<p>H.M. not only lost the ability to form new declarative memories, but also struggled with memory recall. This is called retrograde amnesia, and it is defined by the inability to retrieve memories from before the injury or illness. Real-life retrograde amnesia is different from how it is portrayed by the Bourne character (or other common fictional representations of amnesia).</p>
<p>Real-life retrograde amnesia more recent memories are more likely to be forgotten, while memories from long ago are more likely to be spared. </p>
<p>For example, if a 40-year-old woman suffers from a brain injury resulting in amnesia, she will remember who she is, her childhood and most of her teenage years, then have fewer memories from her 20’s and even fewer from her 30’s, and few to no memories from the year or so before her injury. The first memory Bourne retrieves, in contrast, is the mission that immediately preceded his memory loss, and not older memories of his childhood, for instance.</p>
<h2>Remembering the past</h2>
<p>In the subsequent films, Bourne is shown recalling his past experiences in a fragmentary, near-random way. It is also more strongly suggested in the later films that Bourne is likely suffering something called <a href="http://www.human-memory.net/disorders_psychogenic.html">psychogenic amnesia</a>. Unlike amnesia that stems from an illness or injury that causes brain damage, psychogenic amnesia has no known biological cause and is instead of psychological origin. </p>
<p>Real-life victims of trauma are more likely to have intrusive memories than memory loss. Intrusive memories are suddenly and unexpectedly brought to mind by cues in the environment. Having <a href="http://cdp.sagepub.com/content/19/3/138.abstract">spontaneous memories</a> is common, even for healthy individuals. </p>
<p>Because he is driven to discover his identity by recovering memories, Bourne seeks these types of environmental cues, for example, in “The Bourne Supremacy,” the second film in the series, by revisiting the Berlin hotel where he committed his first assassination. In the third film, “The Bourne Ultimatum,” Bourne returns to the facility where he was trained, and says he “[remembers everything](http://bourne.wikia.com/wiki/The_Bourne_Ultimatum_(film).” </p>
<p>More realistically, individuals who have experienced trauma tend to avoid circumstances that remind them of those tragic events. Their memories of the traumatic event (and events surrounding it) are typically accompanied by strong physiological and emotional reactions. Survivors often struggle with managing the flood of emotions that come with those memories.</p>
<p>A common therapeutic goal is to reduce emotional reactivity to the memory through <a href="http://www.nature.com/neuro/journal/v12/n3/full/nn.2271.html">pharmacological</a> or <a href="http://cpx.sagepub.com/content/early/2015/03/12/2167702614560745">behavioral</a> interventions. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/132992/original/image-20160803-12192-129youk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/132992/original/image-20160803-12192-129youk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/132992/original/image-20160803-12192-129youk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/132992/original/image-20160803-12192-129youk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/132992/original/image-20160803-12192-129youk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/132992/original/image-20160803-12192-129youk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/132992/original/image-20160803-12192-129youk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Putting the pieces together.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Puzzle pieces via www.shutterstock.com.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Putting the pieces together</h2>
<p>Throughout the films, Bourne tries to piece together the events from his life to form a <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2015/08/life-stories-narrative-psychology-redemption-mental-health/400796/">coherent story</a>. This process is common to all of us as we develop and reconstruct autobiographical memory. </p>
<p>Those individuals for whom the trauma defines their life story and their sense of self often suffer the most from symptoms of <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/acp.1290/abstract">post-traumatic stress disorder</a>. Those people who are better able to contextualize and compartmentalize the trauma as a part of their life, but not the most important or central part of their life, seem to have better psychological, social and behavioral outcomes.</p>
<p>Jason Bourne’s memory-related issues are grounded in real-life experiences of both organic amnesiacs and trauma victims. However, his overall pattern of forgetting and then complete retrieval of all of his lost memories is a better plot device than representation of real-world memory loss and recovery.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/62934/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jennifer Talarico does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Jason Bourne’s overall pattern of forgetting and then retrieving memories is a better plot device than representation of real-world memory loss and recovery.Jennifer Talarico, Associate Professor, Psychology, Lafayette College Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/547502016-03-23T10:16:40Z2016-03-23T10:16:40ZMemory loss: it’s not all amnesia<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/114949/original/image-20160314-11288-1p2qp73.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Psychogenic fugue -- when you can't remember anything from your past.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/cat.mhtml?lang=en&language=en&ref_site=photo&search_source=search_form&version=llv1&anyorall=all&safesearch=1&use_local_boost=1&autocomplete_id=&searchterm=memory&show_color_wheel=1&orient=&commercial_ok=&media_type=images&search_cat=&searchtermx=&photographer_name=&people_gender=&people_age=&people_ethnicity=&people_number=&color=&page=1&inline=291653849">www.shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Short-term memory, long-term memory, amnesia, dementia, Alzheimer’s – people often use these terms incorrectly. The reason is partly because memory is one of the most complex mental abilities. It involves experiencing the current moment through the five senses, holding that experience for a fraction of a second, filtering just a proportion of this through to the next stage, consciously holding this information for perhaps 90 seconds, and then either losing the experience or somehow successfully making enough of an impression in the mind that it can be evoked at a later time. </p>
<h2>Classical amnesia</h2>
<p>When people complain of having terrible short-term memory, they are usually referring to not being able to hold onto information for more than a couple of weeks. This difficulty is actually to do with the information not having been stored very efficiently in long-term memory, resulting in rapid forgetting. Real short-term memory is literally what you can hold onto in your consciousness. They can last for just seconds: you’re in a lift, for example, and remember that you’ve already hit the button to go to the floor you need. You won’t recall this for any longer than you need to.</p>
<p>The most famous memory-impaired person ever studied, <a href="https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/175747/permanent-present-tense/">Henry Molaison</a> (referred to as “HM” in the medical literature) had a part of his brain called the hippocampi surgically removed to try and alleviate the devastating epilepsy he suffered from. Following the operation, Molaison did not create a single new long-term memory until he died 50 years later. </p>
<p>Despite this profound impairment, if Molaison was given a string of digits and asked to recall them in the same order, he would have remembered the same number (about seven) that you and I could, and that was because in “classical amnesia” short-term memory is fully intact. </p>
<h2>Post-traumatic amnesia</h2>
<p>The amnesia that Molaison suffered from is very different to the post-traumatic amnesia that can result from head trauma. This tends to be solely for a period of minutes or hours (sometimes days) following a blow to the head. </p>
<p>With post-traumatic amnesia, even if information is transferred successfully into long-term memory, it is still fragile and susceptible to forgetting if the brain’s normal “house-keeping” procedures are disrupted by a physically traumatic event. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/114952/original/image-20160314-11274-1810udh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/114952/original/image-20160314-11274-1810udh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=391&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114952/original/image-20160314-11274-1810udh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=391&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114952/original/image-20160314-11274-1810udh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=391&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114952/original/image-20160314-11274-1810udh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=491&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114952/original/image-20160314-11274-1810udh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=491&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114952/original/image-20160314-11274-1810udh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=491&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">House-keeping temporarily disrupted.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/cat.mhtml?lang=en&language=en&ref_site=photo&search_source=search_form&version=llv1&anyorall=all&safesearch=1&use_local_boost=1&autocomplete_id=&search_tracking_id=jYHXH7UqU_2UPv6YTi_a6w&searchterm=knockout%20&show_color_wheel=1&orient=&commercial_ok=&media_type=images&search_cat=&searchtermx=&photographer_name=&people_gender=&people_age=&people_ethnicity=&people_number=&color=&page=1&inline=67024219">www.shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Psychogenic fugue</h2>
<p>Different still is a “psychogenic fugue”. This is when a person is unaware of their own identity. It’s as if their entire personal memory has been wiped clean. Despite this, they are perfectly able to create new memories. </p>
<p>This little-understood condition is probably caused by an emotionally-traumatic event which causes the personal “psyche” to do a “systems-shutdown”, making access to any personally-relevant information impossible. Examples of this include the “<a href="http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2005/may/16/stevenmorris">Piano Man</a>” who was found on the Kent coast without any awareness of who he was, despite remembering how to play the piano, and the recent case of <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/feb/12/canada-man-missing-amnesia-edgar-latulip">Edgar Latulip</a> who hadn’t known who he was for 30 years but then suddenly seemed to recover his memories. </p>
<p>Given the current lack of understanding of the condition, a neuropsychologist or a neuropsychiatrist can have a difficult job trying to ascertain how genuine the amnesia is. This is especially the case when there is a suspicion that the person might be malingering or faking the memory loss for some sort of gain, for example financial compensation. </p>
<p>A famous example was that of <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/uk/canoe">John Darwin</a> who had disappeared after going out canoeing on his own and had been presumed to have drowned. A number of years later, a man walked into a police station and said that he thought he might be John but he didn’t have any knowledge of who he was. While this could have been a case of psychogenic fugue, when recent photos emerged of him and his wife in Panama, it became obvious that his death had been staged for a big life insurance claim, allowing the couple to move to Panama.</p>
<h2>Dementia</h2>
<p>Equally complex is dementia, which is a group of degenerative disorders of which Alzheimer’s is the best known. Each type of dementia has a unique impact on a person’s abilities. While the gradual erosion of both creating new memories and retrieving old ones is an aspect that people associate with dementia, this is simply because the brain abnormality will be affecting quite diverse regions. This will sometimes include areas that are involved in memory storage and retrieval. </p>
<p>However, the signature of each dementia will depend on where these other areas are and what those areas specialise in. For example, in <a href="http://www.nhs.uk/Conditions/frontotemporal-dementia/Pages/Introduction.aspx">frontotemporal dementia</a>, memory is largely unaffected but the change is in personality and behaviour. But in semantic dementia, the problems are more linguistic and cause difficulty recognising family and friends. </p>
<p>Given the huge complexity of human memory, it is unsurprising that there is so much confusion among the public regarding different types of memory. Sometimes even the professionals get it wrong.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/54750/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ashok Jansari does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>People lose their memory in many different ways. A neuropsychologist explains the lingo.Ashok Jansari, lecturer, Goldsmiths, University of LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.