Scientists talked about the lack of scientific evidence of photographic memory

There is no photographic memory: there is no scientific evidence that the human brain is able to reproduce what it sees with the accuracy of a camera, memory researcher, Professor Gabrielle Principe, said in a Medical Xpress article.

According to Principe, when remembering an event, the brain does not just extract and reproduce a static record of the past. He reconstructs it piecemeal, from fragments of experience available at the moment of recollection. This process is influenced by the search suggestions used, current knowledge, goals, attitudes, and even a person's mood. That's why the same event is remembered a little differently today, tomorrow, or a year from now.

The researcher noted that the closest thing to photographic memory in the scientific literature is eidetic imagery.: the ability to briefly continue to "see" the image studied and removed from the field of view with the inner eye. This phenomenon is rare, occurs mainly in children and usually disappears by adolescence. Even at the peak of their manifestation, eidetic images fade quickly and are not accurate — they may contain distortions and even details that were not present in the original.

Principe also drew attention to the phenomenon of people with highly developed autobiographical memory who are able to recall the events of almost every day of their lives. Many of them describe this gift as exhausting: it is difficult for them to move forward after negative events, because the memories of these moments remain as sharp as on the day they occurred.

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According to the researcher, forgetting itself is a functional mechanism, not a malfunction. It filters out the details of specific episodes and preserves their essence — this allows you to apply past experiences to new situations, and not just to those that exactly coincide with the experience. In addition, blunting memories of negative events protects emotional health and maintains stable self-esteem.

Mnemonics champions, who are able to memorize thousands of numbers or decks of cards in a matter of minutes, also do not have a special brain "machinery" — they use strategies and mental frameworks developed by thousands of hours of purposeful practice. Outside of these strategies, their memory is no different from normal memory.

On April 20, Medical Xpress magazine revealed the causes of sudden short-term memory lapses. According to scientists, working memory allows you to retain and use information for the current task. Experts called the reason for the failures in it too fast switching to a new task, which interrupts the consolidation of data.