A new fMRI study reveals that babies as young as 12 months can encode memories, contradicting theories that memory formation is impossible in infancy.
Instead, the inability to recall early life may stem from retrieval failures rather than memory loss.
Challenging Assumptions About Infant Memory
A new fMRI study challenges the long-held belief that infants cannot form memories. Researchers found that babies as young as 12 months can encode memories, suggesting that infantile amnesia, the inability to recall early childhood experiences, is more likely due to retrieval failures rather than an inability to form memories in the first place.
The Mystery of Infantile Amnesia
Despite infancy being a time of rapid learning, most people cannot remember events from their first three years of life. This phenomenon, known as infantile amnesia, has puzzled scientists for years. One theory suggests that it occurs because the hippocampus, a brain region essential for episodic memory, is not fully developed during infancy. However, studies in rodents challenge this idea, showing that memory traces, or engrams, are formed in the infant hippocampus but become inaccessible over time.
Infants Show Memory in Surprising Ways
In humans, infants demonstrate memory through behaviors such as imitation, recognition of familiar stimuli, and conditioned responses. However, it has remained unclear whether these abilities depend on the hippocampus or other brain structures. To investigate this, Tristan Yates and colleagues used fMRI to scan the brains of infants aged 4 to 25 months while they completed a memory task. The task, adapted from a method commonly used in adult studies, involved showing infants images of faces, scenes, and objects, followed by a memory test based on preferential looking, all conducted during neuroimaging.
Babies Can Encode Individual Memories
The results showed that by around 12 months, the infant hippocampus can encode individual memories. This finding provides strong evidence that the ability to form memories begins in infancy. According to the researchers, the presence of memory encoding mechanisms, despite the temporary nature of these memories, supports the idea that infantile amnesia is primarily due to retrieval failures rather than an inability to create memories.
What Rodent Studies Reveal About Lost Memories
These insights align with previous rodent studies, which suggest that early-life memories can persist into adulthood but remain inaccessible without specific cues or direct stimulation of hippocampal engrams. In a related commentary, Adam Ramsaran and Paul Frankland further explore the study’s implications for understanding how early memories are stored and lost.
References:
Reference: “Hippocampal encoding of memories in human infants” by Tristan S. Yates, Jared Fel, Dawoon Choi, Juliana E. Trach, Lillian Behm, Cameron T. Ellis and Nicholas B. Turk-Browne, 20 March 2025, Science.
DOI: 10.1126/science.adt7570
“Hippocampal encoding of memories in human infants” 20 March 2025, Science.
DOI: 10.1126/science.adt7570
“Babies form fleeting memories” by Adam I. Ramsaran and Paul W. Frankland, 20 March 2025, Science.
DOI: 10.1126/science.adw1923
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46 Comments
I remember being in my crib and thinking, just wait until I can talk. Several incidents from very very early baby years.
I remember thinking too. But I don’t know why I couldn’t move, despite wanting to.
I remember everything from 8 months onward until now, I’m nearly 77 now!
15 concussions, a multiple compound skull fracture, facial trauma. I’m constantly remembering what was. Where I was, when I was. Certain smells remind me of these things. And they say to move on and leave all that behind me. It’s kinda hard. It’s who I am. I just turned 65.😎
Keep rockin’ it.
i remember being in my crib and i remember my brothers crib too i remember feeling some type of what i now attribute to some type of jealousy perhaps? because his crib was so much nicer than me we are 11 mo apart im older i remember new years when i was two remember the bell underpants my mom used to put on me and trying to run away from the horrible sound thinking it was my shadow which i thought was a monster at the time. + according to my mom, I only wore those underwear when I was between the ages of one and two
I remember very detailed information about my first three years. We moved away from a house when I was 18 months old and I remember events, details about the house, neighbors and lots of conversations. I have a whole history there that I loved.
Me too
Being changed in a house we left when I was 8 months old. Parents verified memories and visual clues from that time
dude I cut my own umbilical cord.
and the memories of tha stank placenta.
documented that up in the time bank day 1.
🙃
Can remember back to around 15 months when in a foster home and the man taking me for a walk on Sunday. When we got home, he would sit me on the bottom half of a split door, and would ask his wife for our “treats”.
I remember more than I should. I remember my mother taking a photo of me. Written on the back of the photo, 7 months old and my name. I am 68 yrs now and the photo came into my possession after my mother had passed.
😮
One of my earliest memories is sitting on a couch, looking out the back door while it rained. I was sick and my nose was running. I sat there In hopeless paralysis as it ran down my face.
I do remember things when I was about 1 y old. I am noe 68.
I remember my great grandfather and visiting him in the hospital; he was alert and not yet at the very end of his life. He died 1 month and 20 days after I turned 2.
I also remember being nursed, but we won’t talk about that…
I remember getting into a drawer I wasn’t supposed to in the spring of the year when I turned 2 (birthday being in August). … I see the backs of my chubby baby hands as I root through a collection of mysterious kitchen gadgets. My memory became continuous/cohesive that summer. Someone study me. Lol
My earliest memory is the birth of my brother just before my 3rd birthday.
I remember being so mad when I finally could talk and no one understood me. I thought they were mocking me making all those goo-goo noises and weird faces at me. Why can’t people grasp that babies are tiny humans with full sized feelings and a desire to be autonomous.
I remember I was almost 2 and I was on my brother’s bed although he never lived with us. I had crib I slept in when I slept. I was watching my mom point at the corner ceiling of the room and she would stare at for a long time and sometimes would pick the skin at her lips. She did this quiet aften and being curious I would look at what she was doing but could never figure it out. Later on I took that that it somehow associated with her telling what time it was. I don’t remember any clocks on the walls and I was confident that the time she said, whatever that was, was something she could only figure out until I learned how to tell time. When I was learning that with a clock I would sometimes look at the corner ceiling of the wall to see if could somehow help me tell the time although I still didn’t grasp what time fully meant until I was in about second or third grade. I had my digital wrist watch I would love to tell people the time was because it was easier to me. I was a slow learner and couldn’t grasp 1/4 after or 1/4 till until I was like 14. I never thought about it or listened to people when they said and Germans loved expressing quarters and half pasts. It still confuses me. But my scariest memories and my moms dangle Doppler that was once upstairs calling me to come to her. She was where washing machine was and just stood there with a blank scary looking face reaching to me aggressively. This happened during the day time and I ran so fast and I heard it coming after me so I jumped most of stairwell to the downstairs level where my real mom was yelling at me for jumping the stairs. I told her what happened and she rushed upstairs but said she didn’t see anything but was open to believing what I said and it never happened again. I also rember as a toddler that I had a secret obsession with secretly wanting to pinch this girl I didn’t like. I would pinch my moncheechees and pretend it was her. It was an over whelming want of that feeling I wanted to feel between my fingers and she would cry from it. I wanted to finch her face and her ears and I would think about the times I got In Trouble and I would would fantasize and punishing her and making her cry. The crying playing in my head gave me very stimulating satisfaction I wanted to feel in real life. I never had the chance to ever see her again to practice on her. Those feeling disappeared and I always looked at the as super weird and wondered why.
Dangle doppler? Did you mean doppelganger?
Maybe it’s a regional expression. I was five before I realized that our davenport was actually a couch. Older still when I discovered that scallions were also called green onions.
I wrote a story once:
I was in white diapers. My crib had brown slat sides, up about a foot, which had to be just about eye level, and I was staring at a California Impressionist rendering on the wall; of people behind a wagon walking toward a Eucalyptus stand after their work day, in their easy, late afternoon. There was a tall man in a rumpled white shirt walking behind the wagon, on a road winding toward a break in the trees. Several people were slowly walking the road through the trees, after their long day. The scene was saturated in golds and reds and greens in a warm palate. I became wholly aware and knew what was presented as clearly and easily as I would today. I still see it. How did I know about wagons and work days and toil? And their feelings, heading home in the late afternoon?
Then my diapers got full but that was ok because it was pleasantly warm. A smiling woman swept in greeting me and I smiled seeing her. She changed me, using the extra big diaper pins, which I liked. They were about 4″ long in a black metal finish –
I remember being in the womb. Just flashes of it. I remember my birth. My mother had a C-Section so there was no light, and then a bunch. I remember going from the cold to the heat, which was the first time I could see and feel the sun, and I remember being put in the front seat in between my parents and feeling it being cold again, turns out that was air conditioning like it was in the hospital itself. From there I have scattered memories of living there. It was an apartment in my mother’s family’s basement. Then, from 1978 on I have misc. memories of life there. The snowstorm of 1978. Where we were we got almost 4′ of snow. The snow was taller than I was. My grandfather had cleaned the driveway and the sidewalk going up and down both sides of the street with his new snowblower that scared me. It was loud. I was so short I couldn’t see above the snow. My 3rd birthday. I wanted something to eat so I grabbed a plate full of sauce and ashes and proceeded to lick it hoping the sauce was good. I immediately vomited. I wanted a clubhouse, and my uncle bought me a toy bin, so I was trying to hide in it to make it my clubhouse. From there I remember everything. No more memory gaps. I do not know who made this “Discovery”, but it just may be faulty and need further investigation.
I had many distinctive memories between 1 and 3 years old. We moved to a new house just about the time I turned 3 so it was easy to verify the earlier memories with my parents after that. My very first memory at between 1 and 2 was of the afternoon Sun glimmering brightly on my Parent’s bright gold colored satin bedspread. My birthday cake when I was 2 had cowboys and Indians figures around the cake inside corral fences. I got a massive sparking, smoking noisy battery operated machine gun that was almost to heavy for me to pick up. A neighbor boy same age as me was calling my older Sister names on the other side of our fenced yard. I was furious with him so I tossed a half brick over the fence where I heard him yelling at us. It hit him and we were never friends after that. Our black cocker spaniel Sparky bit my younger Sister’s fingers while she was in her playpen outside. My Parents got rid of Sparky after. Many more memories before 3 years old.
I remember being in my mother’s stomach. People may not believe me but I could hear people but couldn’t make out the words it sound like when your under water and you can hear but can’t make out the words. I also remember the first time I saw my mother I recognize her scent when she carry me and then my eyes cleared up and I saw her I’m not sure how many months I was but I couldn’t walk or hold my head up I was being carried. There’s a lot of things I remember that may surprise you
I had many distinctive memories between 1 and 3 years old. We moved to a new house just about the time I turned 3 so it was easy to verify the earlier memories with my parents after that. My very first memory at between 1 and 2 was of the afternoon Sun glimmering brightly on my Parent’s bright gold colored satin bedspread. My birthday cake when I was 2 had cowboys and Indians figures around the cake inside corral fences. I got a massive sparking, smoking noisy battery operated machine gun that was almost to heavy for me to pick up. A neighbor boy same age as me was calling my older Sister names on the other side of our fenced yard. I was furious with him so I tossed a half brick over the fence where I heard him yelling at us. It hit him and we were never friends after that. Our black cocker spaniel Sparky bit my younger Sister’s fingers while she was in her playpen outside. My Parents got rid of Sparky after. Many more memories before 3 years old.
I can remember holding onto furniture at ten months old and graduating to taking my first few steps, as well as a number of other memories between that point and four years old.
The retrieval has become worse, and at 45 I can only recall the more significant events that left more of an impression on me.
I believe the others.
I have a memory of realising my blanket was a different thing to me. That I could move my hands at will (if clumsily), and so I realised excitedly that they belonged to me, but not the blanket. It wouldn’t move unless pushed with my hands. That was a revelation to me, and likely why I remember it. I was tiny. Not yet able to do much other than sleep and drink, and just starting to explore my immediate surroundings.
I have other memories too, of these small, but important to me, milestones. I remember feeling like a complete person already, just like now, but just trying to get a hang of co-ordination.
I think the research is getting there, but it’s not complete.
I wonder, does rarely thinking in words mean possible continuity of memory from a time when we didn’t know any words? Do verbal thinkers “switch over” and subdue that?
Thank you for sharing your memories. I have also wondered if language development is involved with early memory.
I really like your idea that “pure reactive baby thoughts created by discovery” might be stored using a primitive “operating system” and because there are no words involved, no search can be made on the system. Then at around 3 years, the memories contain words that may make the memories easier to hold, i wish it were as easy that we name the ” memory files” using words and we can search for the memories and “remember”.
I too have early memories from around 6 months on. So many of them are similar to the ones related by others in the comments.
I believe them and you too and glad I stumbled across this article to see in the comments that there’s others who remember like me. I too remember thinking in pre-words before being able to speak. I hope you see my reply and know you’re not alone about it despite what the article says. It definitely needs more study and there needs to be more discussion and recognition of the few of us that have very valid early memories and not some scientific interpretation from those who don’t.
I have several memories without any time line, then at twenty seven months and thirty months I have two specific recollections.
My earliest memory I think involves a great grandmother at her house on her blue couch where she advises my mom to leave me there and use a pillow to keep me from rolling off. She also explained the chiming of the mantle clock. Both when it would chime and how it would sound at each quarter hour. And it did. I must have been there for over an hour.
I remember all the words now, but most likely I did not understand their meaning at that time. It seems that an adult explanation to a pre verbal child can be recalled later when the words are known and impart knowledge in the future.
Although my first memory comes from 3 years old (roughly), my daughter remembered “throwing up all over [her] dress & it was yellow and white & we had to go back home.” I was astonished because she was barely a year old when that happened. We were on our way to church. She had peaches and milk for breakfast.
I have a memory from right after I turned one year old, but I only remember it through a dream I had later on. My other early memory was feeling stuck and abandoned in my crib when I woke up from my nap too early. I must have given up relatively quickly because my caretaker thought I was just being fussy. My therapist said people don’t usually have early memories outside of traumatic memories, which is true in my case, but I know people’s brains develop at different speeds, so it could vary.
I also just thought of this. I think when we’re young, our parents tend to have us focus on the next big thing or the next milestone, not to take in the moment. I know someone as an adult who thinks like that, and they still have terrible memory retrieval. Maybe we don’t remember things until we have an awareness of that type of memory, there is something significant enough to remember (like trauma or something we desire strongly to avoid), or we are slowed down enough to be aware of our surroundings and also enjoy them. As for super early memories, I don’t have any theories outside of differences in development speeds, potentially neurodivergence, or influence by the mother while developing.
I have all kinds of memories from when I was still crawling. Mommy told me to get my shoes, they were “right on the end of my nose”, she said. I touched my nose and of course, they were not there. “Mommy’s crazy” I thought. Also, I remember not being able to see very well on the dark. I have all kinds of early memories. And I think it’s mostly females who have these early memories. My brother and nephew do not.
My first memory was 6 months old, I couldn’t walk or talk just observing while I was in my walker & my dad yelled at my mom for something wildly specific and unimportant.
I can’t remember squat.
Can’t remember last week, tell about 69 years ago. lol.
My hypothesis is that we cannot remember memories until we have developed language skills.
I remember an incident I experienced before I could understand language. I was in a room filled with people, two of which I was familiar with [ Mom and Dad ]. One of the strangers held a balloon in front of me, when BOOM! it exploded in my face. Most of the men in the room laughed, most of the women made angry sounds at the men, all the while I cried loudly and wanted to go back to the warm, happy place where there were no exploding monsters [ home ]. To this day I despise balloons.
Trauma embeds memories like nothing else. Any phobias you have, may have a pre-language origin attached to them.
Thanx for the hilarious comments. There are just as marvellous as the discovery.
Wow, isn’t it amazing how much people can remember. I’m 69 and can’t even remember what I had for breakfast this morning.
Wow, isn’t it amazing how much people can remember. I’m 69 and can’t even remember what I had for breakfast this morning.
I also remember very very early. I was born premature in 1982 and being in the hospital incubator and my parents visiting me. I remember the day my parents brought me home and music by Roy Orbison playing on the radio, drinking out of the preemie bottles with the little bags inside the bottle tube, getting my diaper changed and having diaper rashes, sponge baths and then my parents bathing me in the baby bath over the kitchen sink. I remember teething and chewing on the corner posts of my wooden crib, eating baby food for the first time, and learning how to walk. All this and the textures, smells, and tastes of my baby toys and random objects around me. I remember everything forward, first, second, third birthdays, etc., holidays, being in my playpen with the neighbors baby, and riding in a baby seat on the back of my mother’s bicycle, I’d didn’t realize this wasn’t considered common until many years later as a teenager.