People concerned after woman shares theory about us having ‘goldfish brain’
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A woman who says she has 'goldfish brain' has left people concerned as they admit to feeling the same.
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TikTok user Carla reckons that from birth to current day she actually has very few memories and took to social media to ask if others had ‘literally no memory’ of anything for more than a few years back.
In the clip, Carla - who brands herself ‘goldfish gal’ - says: “Does anyone else have literally no memory of anything beyond, like, four or five years ago?
“I was born, I was six for, like, a glimpse of one weird memory, and then I was 13 for half an hour.
"Now I’m here - that’s it. I don’t have anything else to go by.”
And, somewhat bizarrely, plenty of people seem to be suffering from a similar feeling.
The clip was soon flooded with responses from fellow goldfish-brained individuals who admitted to feeling a bit concerned about the whole situation.
One person said: “You literally described my life. How about when someone tells a story and you were in it but can’t remember?”
Someone else wrote: “I don’t remember any of my teachers, not even college. And some people remember their kindergarten teacher.”
A third commented: “I'm concerned about this. Why do we have no memories?"
Well, before you start to freak out, an expert has explained what is normal in terms of memory.
Psychologist Charles Fernyhough from Durham University explained the amount we remember of our lives varies dramatically from person to person.
He told New Scientist: "There are strong individual differences.
“It’s a characteristic of human memory that we don’t all remember the same kind of things.”
He explained that the things we remember depends upon our interests and emotional responses.
If you can carry out daily tasks and follow a conversation, there's probably nothing to be worried about.
On the other side of the memory spectrum from 'goldfish gal' - a woman called Jill Price can remember every single detail from her entire life.
Price has a condition called hyperthymesia syndrome, which you have probably never heard of because the term was coined specifically to describe Price's condition.
She claims to be able to remember just about anything from her life after the age of 14, right down to the dates of specific days and world events that were ongoing at the time, so long as she knew about them then.
