Childhood Amnesia

Childhood amnesia is the inability of adults to retrieve episodic memories before the age of 2–4 years, as well as the period before age 10 of which adults retain fewer memories than might otherwise be expected given the passage of time. For the first 1–2 years of life, brain structures such as the limbic system, which holds the hippocampus and the amygdala and is involved in memory storage, are not yet fully developed. Research has demonstrated that children can remember events from before the age of 3–4 years, but that these memories decline as children get older.

Research has shown that children have the capacity to remember events that happened to them from age 1 and before, but as they get older they tend to be unable to recall memories from their youngest years. When the offset of childhood amnesia is defined as the age of first memory, then offset occurs around 3.5 years though it can range from 2 to 5 years, depending on the memory retrieval method and age of the respondent. However, when the offset of childhood amnesia is defined as the age at which the majority of memories are personal recollections rather than known events, then offset occurs at approximately 4.5 years old. This may be due to children's development of understanding and knowledge of their own memory.

Changes in encoding, storage and retrieval of memories during early childhood are all important when considering childhood amnesia. Research shows differences between gender and culture, which is implicated in the development of language. Childhood amnesia is particularly important to consider in regard to false memories and the development of the brain in early years. Proposed explanations of childhood amnesia are Freud's Trauma theory, neurological development, development of the cognitive self, emotion and language.