BBC Science Focus

Why can’t we remember early life?

- KAREN EVANS, LEEDS

showed that three-year-olds had a memory of an adult they’d met just once when they were aged one. But for some reason, likely related to the immaturity of infant memory processes, our earliest memories are lost by the time we are about seven years of age. Our inability to remember anything from before the age of three or four is referred to as infantile amnesia and it’s still fairly mysterious. We do know that infants can form long-term memories: chat to a three-year- old about past events and you’ll see for yourself. In fact, one study

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