Differences In Autobiographical Memory Research Articles

Proof-of-concept recall-by-genotype study of extremely low and high Alzheimer’s polygenic risk reveals autobiographical deficits and cingulate cortex correlates

BackgroundGenome-wide association studies demonstrate that Alzheimer’s disease (AD) has a highly polygenic architecture, where thousands of independent genetic variants explain risk with high classification accuracy. This AD polygenic risk score (AD-PRS) has been previously linked to preclinical cognitive and neuroimaging features observed in asymptomatic individuals. However, shared variance between AD-PRS and neurocognitive features are small, suggesting limited preclinical utility.MethodsHere, we recruited sixteen clinically asymptomatic individuals (mean age 67; range 58–76) with either extremely low / high AD-PRS (defined as at least 2 standard deviations from the wider sample mean (N = 4504; NEFFECTIVE = 90)) with comparable age sex and education level. We assessed group differences in autobiographical memory and T1-weighted structural neuroimaging features.ResultsWe observed marked reductions in autobiographical recollection (Cohen’s d = − 1.66; PFDR = 0.014) and midline structure (cingulate) thickness (Cohen’s d = − 1.55, PFDR = 0.05), with no difference in hippocampal volume (P > 0.3). We further confirm the negative association between AD-PRS and cingulate thickness in a larger study with a comparable age (N = 31,966, β = − 0.002, P = 0.011), supporting the validity of our approach.ConclusionsThese observations conform with multiple streams of prior evidence suggesting alterations in cingulate structures may occur in individuals with higher AD genetic risk. We were able to use a genetically informed research design strategy that significantly improved the efficiency and power of the study. Thus, we further demonstrate that the recall-by-genotype of AD-PRS from wider samples is a promising approach for the detection, assessment, and intervention in specific individuals with increased AD genetic risk.

Individual differences in autobiographical memory predict memory confidence but not memory accuracy.

Individual differences in autobiographical memory predict memory confidence but not memory accuracy.

Individual differences in autobiographical memory predict the tendency to engage in spontaneous thoughts

ABSTRACT Individual differences in autobiographical memory have become a research area of interest, but little is known about its associations with other individual differences dimensions, such as the tendency to engage in spontaneous cognition. We report two studies examining individual differences in autobiographical memory, as measured by the Autobiographical Recollection Test (ART), in relation to eight trait-like measures of spontaneous thought and, in Study 2, also a measure of fantasy proneness. In Study 1, the ART correlated positively and systematically with six out of eight measures of spontaneous thought, even when controlling for age, gender, and trait positive and negative affect. The two exceptions concerned spontaneous thoughts specifically related to attentional deficits. Study 2 replicated these findings and extended them to a measure of fantasy proneness. The findings demonstrate that people who generally consider their autobiographical memories to be vivid, detailed, relevant, and coherent, report a higher tendency to engage in various forms of spontaneous cognition, including positive constructive daydreaming, spontaneous mind wandering, involuntary mental time travel, and vivid and immersive fantasy. We discuss these findings in terms of the role autobiographical memory plays in spontaneous thoughts.

Effects of mental context reinstatement on accuracy and recollective experience

AbstractObtaining eyewitness accounts after an event can aid criminal investigations. Mental Reinstatement of Context (MRC) is used to improve memory. However, direct comparisons have identified little effects of MRC relative to free delivery with No‐MRC, and little is known about the effects of MRC on subjective memory characteristics and the role of individual differences in autobiographical memory. Here we exposed 234 participants to a naturalistic film and randomly assigned them to either MRC or No‐MRC before requesting written memory reports and memory characteristics ratings. They also answered an autobiographical memory test. MRC participants reported more unverifiable, but not more accurate, details in Free Recall, whereas they performed better in Cued Recall and delivered higher ratings of Reliving, Vividness, Re‐experience, and Emotions, suggesting a richer recall experience, while Belief/confidence and Scene ratings did not differ. Individual differences in autobiographical memory correlated with memory characteristics but not with accuracy performances.

How well do you think you remember your personal past? French validation of the Autobiographical Recollection Test (ART) and exploration of age effect

ABSTRACT This study aimed to validate a French version of the Autobiographical Recollection Test (ART), a 21-item self-report questionnaire developed by Berntsen, D., Hoyle, R. H., & Rubin, D. C. (2019; The Autobiographical Recollection Test (ART): A measure of individual differences in autobiographical memory. Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition, 8(3), 305–318) examining the subjective quality people attribute to their autobiographical memories. It measures seven distinct but correlated dimensions of memories’ quality varying between individuals: vividness, narrative coherence, reliving, rehearsal, visual imagery, scene, and life-story relevance. 373 participants aged from 18 to 87 years old were invited to complete the questionnaire by rating on a 7-point Likert scale the degree to which they agree with each item. Demographic data and information about their perception of their memory functioning and satisfaction were also collected. Confirmatory factor analysis confirmed the initial seven-factor structure of the ART. Moreover, results showed desirable psychometric properties, with good internal consistency (.94) and test-retest reliability (.83). This scale was also correlated with participants’ perception of memory functioning in daily life. However, there was no correlation with age, confirming prior studies showing that the subjective quality of autobiographical memories does not decline with age. This study thus provides proof of the good psychometric properties of the French version of the ART and promotes its use to explore the subjective quality of autobiographical memories in clinical populations.

Individual differences in autobiographical memory: a Danish version of the Autobiographical Recollection Test (ART)

Individual differences in autobiographical memory have become an area of growing research interest. Recently, the Autobiographical Recollection Test (ART; Berntsen et al., 2019) was introduced. The ART measures individual differences in autobiographical memory along seven components: Vividness, narrative coherence, reliving, rehearsal, scene, visual imagery, and life story relevance. The ART is a useful and easily administered tool, but is so far not available in any of the Nordic languages. The aim of the present study was to provide a Danish translation of the ART and to provide correlations between the Danish ART and characteristics of randomly sampled memories (i.e. memories cued by words) in order to support the validity of the translation. First, the ART was translated into Danish. Then, 122 Danish adults filled out the Danish ART and rated the recollective qualities of three word cued autobiographical memories. The internal consistency was in line with findings on the original English version of the scale as were correlations between the Danish ART, Brief ART and the seven components of the ART. The Danish ART correlated positively with characteristics of the word cued memories corresponding to the seven components of the ART. Additional analyses demonstrated that the magnitude of these correlations were similar to those between ratings of individual memory items, supporting the validity of the ART as a trait-like measure of the recollective experience of autobiographical memory. The ART could be of interest to many areas of psychology and potential applications of the ART are discussed.

Hippocampus and temporal pole functional connectivity is associated with age and individual differences in autobiographical memory

Recollection of one's personal past, or autobiographical memory (AM), varies across individuals and across the life span. This manifests in the amount of episodic content recalled during AM, which may reflect differences in associated functional brain networks. We take an individual differences approach to examine resting-state functional connectivity of temporal lobe regions known to coordinate AM content retrieval with the default network (anterior and posterior hippocampus, temporal pole) and test for associations with AM. Multiecho resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and autobiographical interviews were collected for 158 younger and 105 older healthy adults. Interviews were scored for internal (episodic) and external (semantic) details. Age group differences in connectivity profiles revealed that older adults had lower connectivity within anterior hippocampus, posterior hippocampus, and temporal pole but greater connectivity with regions across the default network compared with younger adults. This pattern was positively related to posterior hippocampal volumes in older adults, which were smaller than younger adult volumes. Connectivity associations with AM showed two significant patterns. The first dissociated connectivity related to internal vs. external AM across participants. Internal AM was related to anterior hippocampus and temporal pole connectivity with orbitofrontal cortex and connectivity within posterior hippocampus. External AM was related to temporal pole connectivity with regions across the lateral temporal cortex. In the second pattern, younger adults displayed temporal pole connectivity with regions throughout the default network associated with more detailed AMs overall. Our findings provide evidence for discrete ensembles of brain regions that scale with systematic variation in recollective styles across the healthy adult life span.

Cultural differences in earliest memory reports by European and Chinese American university students born in the United States

ABSTRACT Grounded by the ecological systems perspectives proposed by Bronfenbrenner (1977, 1979) and Fivush and Merrill (2016), the present study was conducted to examine whether autobiographical memory (AM) and self-construal differed in young adults raised in the same macrosystem, but with unique microsystems. European American (EA) participants were born in the United States to mothers who were born in the United States (n = 61) and Chinese American (CA) participants were born in the United States to mothers who were born in China (n = 47). Participants completed an online study in which they reported on and rated aspects of their earliest memory; they also completed measures of self-construal and acculturation. EA participants identified more with mainstream American culture relative to CA participants, who identified to a greater extent with their heritage culture. EA participants also talked and thought more about their earliest memories relative to CA participants; interactions between group and sex were found for social words. Group differences were not observed on measures of self-construal. These findings indicate that microsystem-level factors are associated with differences in AM in young adults even when individuals are born and raised in the same macro-level cultural environment.

Autobiographical memory predicts postsurgical pain up to 12 months after major surgery.

Recent cross-sectional studies have identified differences in autobiographical memory (AM) among individuals with chronic pain, but the temporal relationship between the 2 is unknown. Moreover, AM has yet to be studied in patients undergoing major surgery. This study addressed these gaps by conducting a prospective, longitudinal study of memory performance, postsurgical pain, and psychosocial factors in 97 adult participants scheduled for major surgery. Memories were evaluated using the Autobiographical Memory Test before and one month after surgery when participants were asked to recall personal events related to positive and pain-related word cues. Responses were coded for level of specificity, emotional valence, and surgery-related content. Questionnaires assessing presence/absence of pain and psychological functioning were administered before and at 1-, 3-, 6-, and 12-month follow-ups. Generalized estimating equations modelled pain at each postsurgical time point with memory variables as predictors. As hypothesized, higher numbers of specific pain memories recalled before surgery predicted lower odds of pain across all time points (OR = 0.58, 95% CI [0.37-0.91]). Participants who took longer to recall pain memories before surgery (OR = 2.65, 95% CI [1.31-5.37]) and those who produced more surgery-related content at the one-month assessment (OR = 1.31, 95% CI [1.02-1.68]) had greater odds of reporting postsurgical pain up to 12 months later. These findings indicate that presurgical AM biases are risk factors for development and maintenance of postsurgical pain. To the extent that these biases are causal, presurgical interventions that modify the quality and content of patients' memories may prove to be promising strategies in the prevention of chronic postsurgical pain.

Individual differences in autobiographical memory: The autobiographical recollection test predicts ratings of specific memories across cueing conditions.

Individual differences in autobiographical memory: The autobiographical recollection test predicts ratings of specific memories across cueing conditions.

Supplemental Material for Individual Differences in Autobiographical Memory: The Autobiographical Recollection Test Predicts Ratings of Specific Memories Across Cueing Conditions

Supplemental Material for Individual Differences in Autobiographical Memory: The Autobiographical Recollection Test Predicts Ratings of Specific Memories Across Cueing Conditions

Individual Differences in Autobiographical Memory: The Autobiographical Recollection Test Predicts Ratings of Specific Memories Across Cueing Conditions

The Autobiographical Recollection Test (ART; Berntsen et al., 2019) measures individual differences in autobiographical memory. We here examined whether the ART correlates with characteristics of people’s specific autobiographical memories. Participants ( N s ≥ 475) completed the ART and rated recollective qualities of autobiographical memories cued by words (Study 1), by positive and negative emotional valence (Study 2), and by future and past temporal direction (Study 3). Scores on the ART consistently correlated with recollective qualities of specific memories and future thoughts, both immediately and after a 1-week delay. The magnitude of these correlations was at the same level as the correlations between individual memory items, underscoring the ability of the ART, as a trait measure to predict ratings of individual memories. The findings support the construct validity of the ART and demonstrate that people’s evaluation of their autobiographical memory, in general, is reliably related to how they remember specific events.

Priming Feminine Typical Traits Does Not Change Autobiographical Memory Narrative Content

Gender differences in autobiographical memory have been reported in many studies using narrative coding of features including emotion word use, connectedness to others, and event specific details, with women using more of these narrative features than men. The current pair of studies explored if these narrative tendencies are linked to a sense of self being feminine, by priming female participants to rate themselves on stereotypically feminine trait terms related to emotionality and relationships. In study 1, an online study, participants provided one high point and one low point memory narrative, either in a priming or control group. Narrative coding only differed between the prime and control groups on one of five narrative coded variables, and order effects suggested that the prime may not have been strong enough to influence the second narrative or low point narratives. Study 2 remedied methodological concerns by conducting in-person data collection, strengthening the prime, and eliciting only high point narratives. In study 2, no effects of the prime were found on narrative coded variables. Findings suggest these narrative variables are not influenced by priming femininity and contribute to a growing literature that is deepening an understanding of the source of gender differences in autobiographical memory.

Properties of autobiographical memories are reliable and stable individual differences

Autobiographical memory research typically focuses on individual memories with variability in individual participants' responses serving as error variance. Integrating individual-difference and experimental approaches demonstrated that properties of autobiographical memories are stable individual differences with stable patterns of correlations. In two sessions approximately one week apart, different cues were used to prompt seven autobiographical memories. Each memory was rated on 12 properties including visual imagery, emotional intensity, narrative coherence, reliving, and past rehearsals. In two studies with samples from different populations (Ns of 200 and 160), each property had a high reliability in both sessions (median α = .90), and the mean of each property averaged over seven memories correlated highly with itself over sessions (median r = .72). Multiple regressions predicting three properties from Session 1 with the remaining nine properties of Session 2 and exploratory factor analyses yielded solutions consistent with expectations from studies of individual memories. Moreover, the correlation matrices of the 12 properties across studies and sessions were extremely similar. Thus, separate sessions, cues, samples, and properties provided generalizable data about individual differences in autobiographical memory. Practical, theoretical, and methodological implications include that individual differences in memory affect: life stories and narrative structure internal to events, stable clinical syndromes and symptoms, experimental results previously attributed to the properties of individual memories, and the confidence people have in the accuracy of their autobiographical and episodic memories.

Ethnic Group Differences in Autobiographical Memory Characteristics: Values as a Mediator or Moderator?

Individual-level values play a role in cultural group differences in autobiographical memory. The current study (N = 192) used a Caribbean sample to examine whether individual-level values (self-transcendence, self-enhancement, conservation) were a mediator or moderator of ethnic group differences (Afro-, Indo-, and Mixed-Trinidadian) in the characteristics (emotional intensity, vividness, thinking and talking about the memory) of positive autobiographical memories. Values were not a mediator, but were a moderator. At high levels of conservation or self-transcendence values, Indo-Trinidadians had autobiographical memories that were more emotionally intense, vivid, and thought and talked about compared to Afro-Trinidadians. Mixed-Trinidadians had autobiographical memories that were more emotionally intense than the other ethnic groups, in general, and more often talked about when self-enhancement values were low. The discussion proposes that the alignment of individual-level values with cultural-group expectations matters for autobiographical remembering, suggests that sociohistorical circumstance may play a role, and addresses the study limitations.

Gender identity better than sex explains individual differences in episodic and semantic components of autobiographical memory: An fMRI study

Advances in the literature of sex-related differences in autobiographical memory increasingly tend to highlight the importance of psychosocial factors such as gender identity, which may explain these differences better than sex as a biological factor. To date, however, none of these behavioral studies have investigated this hypothesis using neuroimaging. The purpose of this fMRI study is to examine for the first time sex and gender identity-related differences in episodic and semantic autobiographical memory in healthy participants (M=19, W=18). No sex-related differences were found; however, sex-related effects of masculine and feminine gender identity were identified in men and women independently. These results confirm the hypothesis that differences in episodic and semantic autobiographical memory are best explained by gender but are an interaction between biological sex and gender identity and extend these findings to the field of neuroimaging. We discuss the importance of hormonal factors to be taken into consideration in the future.

Vividness of recollection is supported by eye movements in individuals with high, but not low trait autobiographical memory

There are marked individual differences in the recollection of personal past events or autobiographical memory (AM). Theory concerning the relationship between mnemonic and visual systems suggests that eye movements promote retrieval of spatiotemporal details from memory, yet assessment of this prediction within naturalistic AM has been limited. We examined the relationship of eye movements to free recall of naturalistic AM and how this relationship is modulated by individual differences in AM capacity. Participants freely recalled past episodes while viewing a blank screen under free and fixed viewing conditions. Memory performance was quantified with the Autobiographical Interview, which separates internal (episodic) and external (non-episodic) details. In Study 1, as a proof of concept, fixation rate was predictive of the number of internal (but not external) details recalled across both free and fixed viewing. In Study 2, using an experimenter-controlled staged event (a museum-style tour) the effect of fixations on free recall of internal (but not external) details was again observed. In this second study, however, the fixation-recall relationship was modulated by individual differences in autobiographical memory, such that the coupling between fixations and internal details was greater for those endorsing higher than lower episodic AM. These results suggest that those with congenitally strong AM rely on the visual system to produce episodic details, whereas those with lower AM retrieve such details via other mechanisms.

Narrative characteristics of autobiographical memory predict expectations of narrator gender

ABSTRACT Gender differences in autobiographical memory have been documented in various domains. The current study attempts to sharpen an understanding of extant gender differences in autobiographical memory by considering listener expectations, contributing to a sociocultural model. Across three studies (a pilot and two separate data collections) a narrative database was created. Narratives were coded for variables that have been shown to differ by gender, including emotion, connectedness to others, factual and interpretive elaboration, and thematic coherence. Participants read narratives and assessed if the narrator was male or female, indicating their confidence. In the pilot study and study 1, narrative features consistently predicted participant’s assessments of narrator gender in two separate methods using the same narratives. In study 2, new narratives were used, showing replicability of the method and avoiding potential confounds of naturally occurring differences in study 1 and pilot data. More emotion words predicted higher likelihood of assessing a female narrator. Results support the use of such a methodology as an innovative way to examine gender-based listener expectations in autobiographical memory. They can be used for further theorising about the source of gender differences in this domain of memory that represents a combination of cognitive and social processes.

The Past as Seen by Women and Men With Alzheimer Disease: Sex Differences in Autobiographical Memory.

Although there is a large body of research demonstrating the negative effects of Alzheimer disease (AD) on autobiographical memory (ie, memory of personal information), little is known about sex differences in autobiographical retrieval in AD. We addressed this issue by inviting patients with AD and healthy control participants to retrieve autobiographical memories and analyzed them with regard to specificity, subjective experience (ie, time travel, emotion, and visual imagery), and retrieval time. Analyses demonstrated no significant differences between women and men with AD with regard to autobiographical specificity, time travel, visual imagery, or retrieval time. However, the higher emotional value was attributed to memories by women with AD than by men with AD. AD seems to equally affect the ability of women and men with AD to construct specific autobiographical memories, to mentally travel in time to relive these memories, to construct mental visual images during memory retrieval, and to organize and monitor search processes, as the latter are mirrored by retrieval time. However, women with AD seem to attribute greater emotional value to autobiographical memories than men with AD.

The Autobiographical Recollection Test (ART): A measure of individual differences in autobiographical memory.

The Autobiographical Recollection Test (ART): A measure of individual differences in autobiographical memory.