The phenomenology of autobiographical retrieval

Abstract

In this article we review the literature on the phenomenology of retrieval from the personal past, and propose a framework for understanding how epistemic feelings and metacognitive reflections guide the retrieval of representations of past events in the Self Memory System. Our focus is on an overlooked aspect of autobiographical memory, the phenomenology of the retrieval process, as opposed to the products of retrieval themselves. As we argue in the present paper, this is not some magical collection of phenomena, but centers on the feeling of familiarity derived from retrieval fluency during the process of retrieval. The relationship between retrieval fluency and retrieved content, interpreted metacognitively is what gives autobiographical retrieval its particular phenomenological “flavor.” To illustrate our point, we focus on two phenomena that only recently were considered alongside each other: the déjà vu experience and involuntary autobiographical memories. Our proposal is that the feeling of familiarity (i.e., this reminds me of something) for the personal past acts to guide deliberate, conscious memory search. We argue that the critical concept in the phenomenology of retrieval is fluency—how readily information comes to mind. This article is categorized under: Psychology > Memory Philosophy > Consciousness Philosophy > Knowledge and Belief

Meta-memory (prediction) of specific autobiographical recall: An experimental approach using a modified Autobiographical Memory Test

“…The association between EOR and generatively-retrieved general memories may be because primed semantic or general knowledge was reported in the Autobiographical Memory Test. As indirect evidence for this, a recent theoretical review suggests that whether to continue retrieval or give up retrieval is determined on the basis of familiarity or semantic fluency with the retrieval target (Moulin et al, 2022). While these researchers also argued that involuntary retrieval (or direct retrieval) occurs when familiarity or fluency of the retrieval target is high and voluntary retrieval (or generative retrieval) occurs when it is low, these are probably not captured by the dichotomy.…”

“…How do we view the likelihood of retrieving autobiographical memories relevant to current goals? These metacognitive aspects of prediction and function have long been overlooked in the context of the specificity and detailedness of autobiographical memories (c.f., Moulin et al, 2022). Williams et al (2007), who conducted the gold standard review in this field, acknowledged that motivation and optimism can affect autobiographical memory specificity, but this notion has not yet been directly examined.…”

The interdisciplinary science of autobiographical memory

“…They explain that stressful events may lead to a blockade of memories, which may lead to dissociative amnesia or amnestic block syndrome in extreme pathological cases. The effect of emotion can somehow be associated with the study of phenomenology of autobiographical memory, as proposed by Moulin et al (2023) who offer an in-depth discussion of the threshold hypothesis. This hypothesis posits that owing to certain phenomenological properties (e.g., emotion, vividness, relevance, unusualness), some mental contents may particularly draw one's memory-related attention, thus passing the awareness threshold more easily and being more likely to be reported.…”

“…Similarly, autobiographical specificity is addressed within the framework of psychiatry (by Barry et al, 2023; Brown, 2023; Bulteau et al, 2023) and neurology (by Fan et al, 2023; Irish, 2023; Kaiser & Berntsen, 2023; Markowitsch & Staniloiu, 2023). As for autobiographical memory, it is investigated through the perspectives of developmental psychology (Fivush & Grysman, 2023), social psychology (Heux et al, 2023), experimental psychology (Sow et al, 2023), and philosophy (Moulin et al, 2023). This interdisciplinary approach is further implemented within each of the 12 contributions.…”

Evidence for a metacognitive awareness of autobiographical memory organisation

“…Other accounts of autobiographical retrieval propose that memory experiences and feelings metacognitively guide the construction of past events from the elaboration of a cue (e.g. [4] ). Even though such processes have been suggested, the extent to which we can readily monitor what we retrieve from AM has not been documented.…”