Deja vu Mystery Solved?

[DrmDoc]

According to this New Scientist article, researchers at the University of St. Andrews in the UK found that this "phenomenon" may not involve false memory production as some have speculated. Researchers were able to trigger this phenomenon, through a word association method, during fMRI study of 21 volunteers. Their method involved presenting each volunteer with a series of associated words excluding a keyword linked to that association as a likely trigger. When asked under fMRI whether the volunteers recalled that keyword as part of their word association, which they did, researchers observed activity in the prefrontal cortex rather than the hippocampus. Prior to that observation, it was believe that deja vu primarily involved the hippocampus and it association with memory formation. One researcher concludes that deja vu may involved a type of memory resolution process, which another researcher believes is advantageous to a healthy brain, according to the article. I disagree with their findings because of issues I perceive with their deja vu induction methods; however, it's an interesting article regarding the nature of some false memories. Enjoy!

Edited September 7, 2016 by DrmDoc

[iNow]

Hmmm

[DrmDoc]

Hmmm, indeed. The problem I have with their assessment is that researchers began with the presumption of deja vu as a type of false memory production when the phenomenon is perceived more as an instant and precise replay of an immediate event or experience. Perhaps their results are significant for false memory study; however, in my view, there's a distinction between false memories based on previously known word associations and the perception of reliving or instantly re-experiencing some immediate moment or event not previously experienced or known. Essentially, their results show how false memories can be created from previously known and remembered associations, while deja vu appears to involve previously unexperienced, therefore, unknown moments perceived as past memories.

[Ophiolite]

Didn't you post last week?

[DrmDoc]

Didn't you post last week?

 

Ha! I was a bit slow on the uptake, but I get it The funny thing is, I do remember posting something like this before but have yet to find evidence that I had...spooky.

[bimbo36]

somtimes these de javus are so strong ... that it makes you almost mental ...

 

maybe its due to not enough exposure to real world and outside life ...

[Memammal]

however, in my view, there's a distinction between false memories based on previously known word associations and the perception of reliving or instantly re-experiencing some immediate moment or event not previously experienced or known. Essentially, their results show how false memories can be created from previously known and remembered associations, while deja vu appears to involve previously unexperienced, therefore, unknown moments perceived as past memories.

I agree.

Edit: I did not read the study, but deja vu seems less reliant on communication or visualization and more reliant on a particular experience (quale?) that triggers it, no?

Edited September 9, 2016 by Memammal

[DrmDoc]

I agree.

Edit: I did not read the study, but deja vu seems less reliant on communication or visualization and more reliant on a particular experience (quale?) that triggers it, no?

 

As I review the methods researchers applied to their study, I think their results are more applicable to the so-called Mandela Effect. This effect involves the false memories held by large groups of individuals surrounding some central well-known or pivotal fact, event, item, or subject. Believers in this effect frequently reference its examples as evidence of one's transit between alternate realities. The examples of this effect are, in my opinion, identical to the results produced by the word association method used in the above referenced Deja vu study. Perhaps this research is of more value to the study of false memories and the Mandela Effect than Deja vu phenomena.

[Memammal]

Re the Mandela Effect...this is the first time that I have read/heard about it. A kind of group confabulation..? Thank you for sharing.

[MezanRobel]

i haven't experience deja vu since long ago when i was 10 and i think its imagination of our own mind when we grow up we lose imagination relatively.

[OldChemE]

With no real basis, I have often wondered if Deja Vu might simply be a memory timing issue. We have short term memory and long term memory. If somehow an experience slips into long term memory faster than it arrives in short-term, might we believe we have had this experience before??

[hoola]

I rarely have deja vu "like" experiences,sometimes a word heard or internal thought might trigger a near instantaneous feeling of "that stimuli was a repitition of a prior event", but the other day I went and borrowed a part for a heater in my living room. Came home and anxious to complete the job, skipped dinner. This was an all day job. As I finished the task, a movie played in my head of the highlights of the entire day and was accompanied by a warm, rather pleasant feeling, (extending from my solar plexus to the top of my head) of being "in sync" with the universe, that lasted perhaps ten or fifteen seconds. The intellectual reaction after the experience ended was one of surprise of the thought that I had done this all before, almost as a "deterministic act" embedded in a randomized world.

Edited January 16, 2017 by hoola

[Dr cool]

I have had a few dreams and like most they made no logical sense but generated a deja vu experience. It was almost as though I'd had the same dream a long time beforehand.

 

No narcotics involved either.

Edited January 27, 2017 by Dr cool

[demon]

i haven't experience deja vu since long ago when i was 10 and i think its imagination of our own mind when we grow up we lose imagination relatively.

are you kidding me ?

you dont lose your imagination , it is just that you are more busy and your brain gets occupied almost all the time .

experiencing Deja vu is good your brain too , it enhances your thinking and reasoning skills .

[Eise]

[DrP]

You know - I didn't know what Deja Vu was before I first saw that sketch... I was quite young though at the time.

[iNow]

experiencing Deja vu is good your brain too , it enhances your thinking and reasoning skills .

^citation needed

[DrmDoc]

^citation needed

 

Indeed; I'd be very interested in reviewing it...if it exists.

[SFNQuestions]

Damn I could have sworn I saw an article like this before...