Sadia Week 13: The Glitch in Memory



You're in mid-conversation, and suddenly, you know exactly what the next words will be. Or you are doing something and feel like you have stood in that same spot, in that exact way, at some forgotten point in time. That hazy memory flickers, familiar yet impossible, and then just as quickly, it is gone. That's Déjà vu, the strange glitch in memory that leaves us confused as though we have lived this life or moment before. 

Psychologists have tried to explain the science behind déjà vu, a French term meaning "already seen", coined by French philosopher Émile Boirac, linking the phenomenon to a theory that our brain recognizes situations, another part of our brain tries to find "familiarity against [our] recall of past experiences."Akira Robert O'Connor, a psychologist at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland, claims that "[w]hen no actual matches are found, the result is a discomfiting sense of having seen it all before." In other words, our brains file a new moment in the 'past' instead of the 'present,' or maybe they just recognize patterns from memories we don't even realize we've stored. Furthermore, O'Connor mentions that "young people actually experience more déjà vu than older people" but older people "still recognize such false familiarity." Déjà vu is "the same across people with healthy brains and those with neurological conditions" and experiencing it does not have any significant impact on our health. 

Despite these explanations (although I don't experience them a lot) it leaves me questioning our existence, have we lived before? Does our brain know something we don't? Is time repeating itself? It feels genuine, even though our brain generates it based on our memories and dreams. 

Works cited
Pappas, Stephanie. “What Causes Déjà Vu?” Scientific American, 1 Feb. 2023, www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-causes-the-feeling-of-deja-vu/.

Blanchfield, Theodora. “What Is Déjà vu and Why Do We Experience It?” Verywell Mind, 31 May 2022, www.verywellmind.com/what-is-deja-vu-why-do-we-experience-it-5272526.

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Comments

  1. Raghav DagaMarch 26, 2025 at 3:07 PM

    Hello Sadia! I really appreciate the fact that you chose to back up your claims and information about Deja Vu with research and expert opinions, making your blog educational along with reflective. The way you started your blog by placing the reader in a situation that is all too familiar, the blog is immediately captivating. The use of imagery enhances this grasp, making something so difficult to understand seem more approachable in the form of words. Although this is a commonly discussed phenomenon with people often finding themselves in such situations, by choosing to explore the science and origins of the concept, your blog takes a far more educational approach to this. The final paragraph finally incorporates your personal experience with the objective reality that you discussed in previous paragraphs, posing a deep question that I have asked myself too. From my experience and understanding of biology, I personally do not believe that Deja Vu is anything more than a very real feeling of hallucination, since the theory of our conscience living before we knew it seems too far fetched. However, I would love to engage in further discussion about this question!

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  2. Anika SahaniMarch 26, 2025 at 5:25 PM

    Hi Sadia! I found the topic of your blog to be quite interesting, as over the last few weeks I have noted experiences of deja vu more often than usual, and I found myself pondering these very same ideas. The scientific description of deja vu has made it all the more intriguing to me, as memories are misfiled under the past rather than the present. I wonder what may have caused this misconception, whether there are certain triggers that make memories more likely to be filed under the past? Maybe if you had a memory previously that is similar to the moment which you are currently experiencing, it is more likely to be categorized under the past? I also find how rapidly this occurs to be interesting, as if it truly is a new memory, how does your brain immediately think it has occurred before? I also found that sometimes I experience deja vu and think that I have experienced deja vu with that same event before, which is incredibly interesting but tremendously overcomplicated. Thanks for bringing this to my attention again through your blog, I will have to look into it more!

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  3. Kaden KhauMarch 26, 2025 at 7:26 PM

    Hi Sadia! I found the topic of your blog to be quite interesting as I experience deja vu a lot. The fact ands claims you researched really made you blog educational and also reliable. As I mentioned, I often experience deja vu and a reading i found along time ago kind of related to your last paragraph. It talked about how deja vu could just be us in another dimension with the same thing happening as it normally occurs during dreams. Although this is a commonly discussed phenomenon with people that also experience deja vu, your approach using a far more educational stance on the subject, which I find intriguing, as it encourage me to read more about it. Deja vu poses deep questions to myself of "why have I even experienced this before?" and leaves me stunned when it actually turns out to be true. Thanks for bringing this to my attention and your blog was really fun to read!

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