• Question: My friend Hamza Karam was born on September 11th 1997 and on his fourth birthday, the tragic 9/11 event happened. RIP to all who suffered and died. Anyway, he recalls seeing this happen on tv and he was only 4 years of age. I read this article online quite a while ago which states you lose all your memory when you hit the age of four so you can not remember doing something when you was 2 years old or something unless someone has passed that information onto you. Anyway, is it possible for him to remember 9/11 eventhough it occured ON his fourth birthday? P.S he tends to lie a lot and everyone knows he lies a lot.

    Asked by suh9000 to Emma, Jimmy, Janet, Niall, Simon on 18 Mar 2013.
    • Photo: Niall Crawford

      Niall Crawford answered on 18 Mar 2013:

      He probably won’t forget all his childhood memories, but you are right there is a process where the brain loses memories of a young age, and this is because certain parts of the brain haven’t developed yet. As time goes on, he will probably find it harder to remember these moments, but time changes memories for everyone.It was a very big moment in modern history, and so I’ve no doubt he can recall the day and everyone talking about it, but actual events of the day might not be so clear.

    • Photo: James Holloway

      James Holloway answered on 18 Mar 2013:

      I don’t think you lose all your memories on your 4th birthday quite so suddenly, you can imagine waking up and not knowing where you were or who your mum is!

      I have quite a lot of childhood memories, most are from ~ 7 – 10 years old but I have one or two where I must have been a toddler.

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