Veronika V. Nourkova

Background. Whereas reciprocal relationships between autobiographical memory and self are broadly emphasized, there is no empirical research that examines how major life changing transitions affect the graphically expressed life story. 

Objective. The paper focuses on the novel topic of autobiographical memory in transsexual individuals. 

Design. Twenty-eight volunteers who had undergone gender-affirming surgery and 28 non-transgender participants were asked to produce a Life Line which required them to identify the most memorable events in their lives. The level of acquisition of affirmed gender-typed traits was measured by the Bem Sex-Role Inventory (BSRI). 

Results. Compared to cisgender individuals, transsexual participants have self-focused Life Lines with a high proportion of vivid flashbulb-like memories and unhappy recollections of childhood. The emotional profile of autobiographical memory addressing childhood was more negative in transsexual participants who deviate from BSRI norms reflecting derogation of past gender category in favour of affirmed gender identity. Those with high acquisition of affirming gender-typed traits assigned more space on the timeline for childhood, revealing the process of self-continuity restoration that leads to an increase in the proportion of positive memories. Accordingly, transsexuals recollected fewer events relevant to their gender identity performing a psychological defence toward the topic of gender. 

Conclusion. We interpreted the results by focusing on the utility of autobiographical memories as a cognitive resource for filling the gap between past and current selves and maintaining self-continuity across the lifespan.

In the present paper we suggest that people experience history from four perspectives: Participant, Witness, Contemporary and Successor. These perspectives differ in the proportion of experience, knowledge and personal meaning that is available. We empirically demonstrated greater malleability of memories about terrorist attacks that were experienced as a Witness than as a Contemporary. We also review research on the extent to which people spontaneously use historical events as a reference for dating personal memories. In our Moscow sample (N = 476), historical references were present in 5% of people. We found that 17% of participants listed historical memories in their life stories, as indicated by where they placed events along a Life Line. There was a tendency to balance negative historical experience with positive events from the Contemporary perspective (Gagarin'61, Olympic Games'80). Older participants included historical memories in their Life Lines more often than younger participants did, while the majority of historical memories referred to the age before 29. Participants recollected historical memories only from periods in their past that fell within what is called the "reminiscence bump" - a lifetime period that covers the age interval between 18-28 years. The proportion of historical content in individual autobiographical memory is deter­mined by: 1) objective history; 2) experiencing historically transitional events in youth; 3) being older than the "reminiscence bump" period and 4) having at least a decade time distance toward historical event

Participants in Experiment 1 completed a 36-item life events inventory (LEI) in their native language (Russian) two separate times, over a 1-week period. Between the two LEIs, participants got 12 items translated from Russian into English and 12 items in Russian. They performed a series of English-language exercises on translated items and Russian-language exercises on non-translated items. After performing exercises on items translated from Russian into English participants increased their confidence that these life events had occurred in their personal past. There was no similar effect for nontranslated items and for control items. Experiment 2 was run to examine if two factors - a change in linguistic context and a change in level of abstraction taken together boosted the effect. Participants completed a 24-item LEI in Russian two separate times, over a 1 -week period. Between the two LEIs, participants got 12 of these life events at the higher level of abstraction (e.g., "Got lost in a shopping mall" or "found yourself at an unfamiliar public place") translated from Russian into English. Participants translated the event from English into Russian and wrote a sentence using the gist of the item. After performing language exercises on items at the higher level of abstraction participants increased their confidence that these life events had occurred in their personal past. The magnitude of effect was almost twice bigger than in Experiment 1. These results indicate that a change in linguistic context can produce imagination inflation. We discuss our findings in terms of familiarity misattribution, whereby processing fluency is experienced as familiarity and misattributed to autobiographical memory.