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The frequency of involuntary autobiographical memories and future thoughts in relation to daydreaming, emotional distress, and age.

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Date
2015-11
Authors
Berntsen, Dorthe
Rubin, David C
Salgado, Sinue
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Abstract
We introduce a new scale, the Involuntary Autobiographical Memory Inventory (IAMI), for measuring the frequency of involuntary autobiographical memories and involuntary future thoughts. Using the scale in relation to other psychometric and demographic measures provided three important, novel findings. First, the frequency of involuntary and voluntary memories and future thoughts are similarly related to general measures of emotional distress. This challenges the idea that the involuntary mode is uniquely associated with emotional distress. Second, the frequency of involuntary autobiographical remembering does not decline with age, whereas measures of daydreaming, suppression of unwanted thoughts and dissociative experiences all do. Thus, involuntary autobiographical remembering relates differently to aging than daydreaming and other forms of spontaneous and uncontrollable thoughts. Third, unlike involuntary autobiographical remembering, the frequency of future thoughts does decrease with age. This finding underscores the need for examining past and future mental time travel in relation to aging and life span development.
Type
Journal article
Subject
Aging
Daydreaming
Emotional distress
Episodic future thinking
Involuntary autobiographical memories
Adult
Age Factors
Fantasy
Female
Humans
Male
Memory, Episodic
Middle Aged
Psychometrics
Reproducibility of Results
Stress, Psychological
Surveys and Questionnaires
Thinking
Time Factors
Young Adult
Permalink
https://hdl.handle.net/10161/12024
Published Version (Please cite this version)
10.1016/j.concog.2015.07.007
Publication Info
Berntsen, Dorthe; Rubin, David C; & Salgado, Sinue (2015). The frequency of involuntary autobiographical memories and future thoughts in relation to daydreaming, emotional distress, and age. Conscious Cogn, 36. pp. 352-372. 10.1016/j.concog.2015.07.007. Retrieved from https://hdl.handle.net/10161/12024.
This is constructed from limited available data and may be imprecise. To cite this article, please review & use the official citation provided by the journal.
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Scholars@Duke

Rubin

David C. Rubin

Juanita M. Kreps Distinguished Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience
  For .pdfs of all publications click here  My main research interest has been in long-term memory, especially for complex (or "real-world") stimuli. This work includes the study of autobiographical memory and oral tra
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