What did we see as children? Or is it that the human brain simply doesn't have enough memory...?
Do you remember anything from before you were 3 years old? The academic community believes that children aged 3 to 4 begin to forget things from before they were 3 years old.
This also explains why most people don't have memories of anything before the age of three. So, what exactly is this childhood "amnesia"?
Where did my memories from before I was 3 years old go?
The latest explanation is here.
Researchers at Rutgers University in New Jersey published a study on children's behavior, observing the reactions of infants aged 2-18 months to wind chimes. They found that infants aged 2-6 months showed no special behavior, while infants aged 9-12 months frequently kicked their legs as the wind chimes turned. The conclusion was that we have memories from 0-3 years old.
As for the forgetting of memories before the age of three, Freud called it "childhood amnesia." However, scientists are still trying to explain this phenomenon, but a complete conclusion has yet to be reached. Two of the more mainstream explanations are:
1. The brain's neural network is not fully developed.
The human brain's neural network is incredibly complex, containing approximately 100 billion neurons, making it more complex than any computer in the world.
However, brain development is not completed at birth; it continues to develop, reaching its peak at age 3.
Before the age of 3, the physical connections between neurons are unstable, which may cause some memories to be lost.
2. Brain optimization
Some scientists believe that before the age of two or three, the brain is like a garbage can, accepting all kinds of memory information. At this time, the neural network is very chaotic, and the influx of a large amount of information makes it difficult for the brain to concentrate. In order to solve this problem, the ancestral code in the genes makes the brain quickly delete garbage memories. This process is like the garbage cleaning of a computer, iterating and upgrading.
Regarding "childhood amnesia"
And these hypotheses
In adulthood, people often cannot recall memories from before the age of three, which is considered a normal phenomenon. The exact reasons for this forgetting are not fully understood, but several main hypotheses exist:
1. Age-related brain development:
The brain undergoes significant development and maturation during infancy and early childhood. Neurons and neural circuits in the brain are forming and consolidating. During this process, some early-formed connections and memories may be overwritten and replaced by new neural connections. This remodeling and rewiring resulting from brain development may be one of the reasons for forgetfulness in infants and young children.
2. Limited language skills:
Language is a key tool for memory, aiding in the encoding and storage of memories. However, before the age of three, infants' language abilities are not fully developed. They may lack the ability to translate early experiences and memories into language, resulting in these memories not being stored and recalled in linguistic form.
3. The brain's information overload strategies:
During infancy and early childhood, the brain is bombarded with a deluge of new stimuli and information. To process and filter this information, the brain may employ an adaptive strategy of information overload, storing important memories while discarding past ones. This strategy helps infants and toddlers focus their attention on the current learning and developmental process, creating space for subsequent learning and memory building.
Actually, memories before the age of 3
It hasn't completely disappeared.
A 2016 study published in *Nature Neuroscience* showed that our earliest memories are actually traceable. The research indicates that the brain's memory storage is not inherently flawed; the reason we can't recall memories is primarily due to the inability to retrieve them correctly. However, with appropriate stimulation, successful retrieval is achievable. For example, procedural actions like sleeping, walking, running, eating, and drinking, once formed in memory, can be performed autonomously without conscious effort and are almost always remembered throughout life.
For children, memories with strong emotional impact, such as warmth, happiness, fear, sadness, and other intense emotional fluctuations, are more likely to be remembered. Therefore, parents of newborns and toddlers need to build their child's trust in the world and their inner sense of security, and need to actively respond to their child's needs. In the first few months after birth, parents need to use gentle voices and physical touch to create warm memory stimulation for the child, thereby helping them develop a sense of security and trust. Although some memories may be forgotten as the child grows, implicit memories that cannot be retrieved can remain in the brain. During their formative years, children experience warmth through hugs and comfort from their parents, and external encouragement and acceptance profoundly influence the formation of their personality and character. These influences make them feel that the world is warm and explorable, and that their parents are trustworthy.
Individual subjects
Able to recall earlier memories
While the "childhood amnesia" hypothesis helps explain why the brain erases memories from before the age of three, more research is needed to confirm and understand it. Several experimental findings and data are noteworthy in exploring the mechanisms of forgetting in the brain.
A study suggests that the loss of early memories is not universal but rather varies from person to person. This research, through memory tests on adults, found that while most could not recall memories from before the age of three, some participants were able to recall even earlier memories, with some reports indicating that some could recall memories from when they were two years old or earlier. This suggests that there are individual differences in how the brain stores and recalls memories.
Another experimental study showed that infants' memories are retrieved and retained for a short period. This study, through visual memory experiments on infants, found that infants can only retain and recall stimuli when the time intervals between repeated exposures are short. Once the time interval exceeds a certain threshold, infants cannot recall the previous stimuli. This means that infants' memories may be very short-lived and not stored long-term in the brain, causing them to be quickly forgotten.
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