Blog 2 (Chapters 6 and 7)

For my second blog I will be focusing on infantile amnesia and the various reasons for this phenomena, as discussed on pages 159-160 of the textbook. Infantile amnesia is defined as having a lack of memories occurring before 3 years of age. Most people report not having memories or only having short glimpses of past events before the age of 3. One possible reason for infantile amnesia could be due to the fact that language plays a key role in how memories can be recalled and discussed. Since language is not available for infants to use, they have less ability to continually recall past events which would thereby reaffirm their existence.

I find infants and infant development to be incredibly interesting and I really enjoyed reading through chapters 6 and 7 of our textbook which primarily dealt with various aspects related to infancy. Another interesting idea discussed on page 160 of the textbook relays that memories of personal experience seem to be inaccurate before the ages of 18 to 24 months of age. More research is needed to determine why this may be and I am anxious to read more about any future findings infant development may tell us.