TY  - JOUR
A1  - Hutmacher, Fabian
A1  - Morgenroth, Karolina
T1  - The beginning of the life story: The meaning of the earliest autobiographical memory from an adult perspective
JF  - Applied Cognitive Psychology
N2  - Earliest autobiographical memories mark a potential beginning of our life story. However, their meaning has hardly been investigated. Against this background, participants (N = 182) were asked to think about two kinds of meaning: the meaning that the remembered event might have had in the moment of experience and the meaning that the memory of the event has for their present life situation. With respect to the meaning in the moment of experience, participants most frequently referred to situational characteristics. The meaning for the present life situation was most frequently related to aspects of the memory that told something about the person beyond the immediate context of the remembered event. Moreover, these meanings were more frequently associated with continuity than with a contrast between then and now. Apart from these overarching commonalities, our data also show that the earliest autobiographical memories of different people can tell very different stories.
KW  - earliest autobiographical memories
KW  - meaning-making
KW  - early memory
KW  - autobiographical memory
KW  - life story
Y1  - 2022
U6  - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-318610
SN  - 0888-4080
VL  - 36
IS  - 3
SP  - 612
EP  - 622
ER  - 
TY  - JOUR
A1  - Hutmacher, Fabian
A1  - Schläger, Linus
A1  - Meerson, Rinat
T1  - Autobiographical memory in the digital age: Insights based on the subjective reports of users of smart journaling apps
JF  - Applied Cognitive Psychology
N2  - Humans have long used external memory aids to support remembering. However, modern digital technologies could facilitate recording and remembering personal information in an unprecedented manner. The present research sought to understand the potential impact of these technologies on autobiographical memory based on interviews with users of smart journaling apps. In Study 1 (N = 12), participants who had no prior experience with smart journaling apps tested the app Day One for 2 weeks and were interviewed about their subjective perceptions afterwards. In order to cross-validate the obtained findings, Study 2 (N = 4) was based on in-depth interviews with long-time users of different smart journaling apps. Taken together, the two studies provide insights into the way autobiographical remembering may change in the digital age – but also into the opportunities and risks potentially associated with the use of technologies that allow creating a detailed and multimedia-based record of one's life.
KW  - autobiographical memory
KW  - total recall
KW  - smart journaling
KW  - digital age
KW  - new media
Y1  - 2023
U6  - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-318620
SN  - 0888-4080
VL  - 37
IS  - 4
SP  - 686
EP  - 698
ER  -