Why can’t you remember being a baby? With Nicholas Turk-Browne, PhD

In this episode of Speaking of Psychology, host Kim Mills interviews Dr. Nicholas Turk-Browne about childhood or infantile amnesia, exploring why people can't remember early childhood experiences. Dr. Turk-Browne discusses the two main hypotheses: whether the infant brain is too immature to store durable memories or if memories are stored but become inaccessible later in life. He references rodent studies using optogenetics, which suggest that memories may be present but require direct stimulation for retrieval. The conversation covers the challenges of studying infant memory, the use of fMRI to study the hippocampus in babies, and the development of techniques to keep infants comfortable during brain imaging. They also touch on the potential for brain imaging to reveal insights into how babies experience the world, the role of context in memory retrieval, and the implications of this research for parents and educators.