People often want to cherish their childhood memories but fail to recall their favorite moments after many attempts due to memory loss or several other factors.
Latest research reveals that scientists found a new trick to revive childhood memories in real time.
News scientific research suggests that temporarily changing how people perceive their own bodies can help them recall personal memories, potentially even those from their earliest years of life.
According to a research published in Scientific Reports, the first ever study shows how adults can retrieve more early-life memories after viewing and embodying a version of their own face that has been digitally transformed to look like their childhood self.
The experiment was carried out by neuroscientists at Anglia Ruskin University ARU in Cambridge that involved 50 adult participants, using a unique technique called “Enfacement illusion.”
The new illusion technique allows individuals to perceive a face displayed on a computer screen as their own reflection.
Moreover, the participants were also shown a live video feed of their face that had been digitally altered with an image filter to resemble how they might have looked as children.
As soon as the participants moved their heads, the modified face mirrored their movements in real time, reinforcing the illusion that the child-like face belonged to them.
Following the enfacement illusion the participants took part in an autobiographical memory interview, where they were asked to recall events from both their childhood and the past year.
The researchers then analysed how much detail participants provided when describing their episodic autobiographical memories that allows people to mentally relive personal experiences and travel back in time or associate themselves with specific moments from their past.
In addition, the results revealed that changes in bodily self-perception can influence how easily individuals access distant memories.
Participants who viewed the child-like version of their face recalled significantly more detailed childhood memories than those who saw their current adult face.
The research team evaluates the findings, which shed new light on the link between bodily awareness and autobiographical memory retrieval.
According to neurologists, childhood memories are formed as recollections from early life, often associated with happiness, play, and family.
These memories can be positive or negative and are shaped by an individual's experiences with many adults, many of whom are unable to remember anything at the initial stage of childhood.
Senior author ProfessorJane Aspell at Anglia Ruskin University said, “When our childhood memories were formed, we had a different body, so we wonder if we could help people experience aspects of that body again, and help them recall their memories from that time."
People generally remember little from the early years before age 3, and children’s memory abilities don’t fully mature until about age 7.
According to the study, the results could eventually lead to new methods for accessing long-forgotten memories, including those from the ‘childhood amnesia period’, which typically occurs before the age of 3.
While concluding the outcome from enfacement illusion, Lead Author of the study Jane Aspell said, “These results are fascinating and suggest that further, more sophisticated body illusions could be used to unlock memories from different stages of our lives."
“In the future, it may even be possible to adapt the illusion to create interventions that might aid memory recall in people with memory impairments," added Jane.