Challenging assumptions about infant memory, a novel functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study shows that babies as young as 12 months old can encode memories, researchers report. The findings suggest that infantile amnesia – the inability to remember our first few years of life – is more likely caused by memory retrieval failures rather than an inability to form memories in the first place. Despite infancy being a period of rapid learning, memories from this time do not persist into later childhood or adulthood. In general, humans cannot recall events from the first three years of life – a phenomenon known as infantile amnesia. Why grown humans have a years-long blind spot in their episodic memory for the period of infancy remains a puzzle. One theory suggests this occurs because the hippocampus, a brain region crucial for episodic memory, is not fully developed during infancy. However, research in rodents challenges this idea, showing that memory traces, or engrams, are formed in the infant hippocampus but become inaccessible over time. In humans, infants demonstrate memory through behaviors such as conditioned responses, imitation, and recognition of familiar stimuli. However, whether these abilities rely on the hippocampus or other brain structures remains unclear. In a study using fMRI to scan the brains of infants aged ~4 to 25 months while performing a memory task, Tristan Yates and colleagues aimed to determine whether the hippocampus in infants can encode individual memories. The memory task, adapted from a well-established method for adults, involved showing images to infants – faces, scenes, and objects – followed by a memory test based on preferential looking, all while undergoing neuroimaging. The findings show that the infant hippocampus has the capacity to encode memories of individual experiences beginning around 1 year of age, providing evidence that the capacity to form individual memories develops during infancy. According to the authors, the presence of encoding mechanisms for episodic memory during infancy – despite their ephemeral nature – suggests that infantile amnesia is more likely due to failures in memory retrieval mechanisms. These insights align with recent studies in rodents, which demonstrate that memories created during infancy can persist into adulthood but remain inaccessible for retrieval without direct stimulation of hippocampal engrams or reminder cues, the authors note. In a Perspective, Adam Ramsaran and Paul Frankland discuss the study in greater detail.

Canada is the happiest country in the G7, according to the World Happiness Report edited by a Simon Fraser University professor. 

While Canada remains the only G7 member in the Top 20, the U.S. slides to its lowest-ever position, according to Lara Aknin, distinguished professor of social psychology at SFU and an editor of the report released today. “The U.K. and the U.S. have fallen out of the top 20,” says Aknin. “Canada is one of the great global powers left in the top 20. Nordic countries remain at the top with Finland holding the number one spot for the eighth year in a row.” Other countries, like Mexico, have jumped up in the ranks, she adds.  

Americans have long believed that sports are one area in society that offers kids from all backgrounds the chance to succeed to the best of their abilities. But new research suggests that this belief is largely a myth, and that success in high school and college athletics often is influenced by race and gender, as well as socioeconomic status, including family wealth and education.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is increasingly being used in many countries worldwide to provide public social services, assisting in entitlement decisions to state-paid pensions and unemployment benefits, assessments of asylum applications, and assignments of places at kindergartens. AI technology is intended to help apply fairness criteria in the allocation of this kind of support to individuals and to assess potential beneficiaries accordingly. However, fairness criteria vary from country to country. In India, for example, the caste system influences the distribution of social benefits. In China, access to social services is determined by a "good citizenship" score. But the concepts of fairness in terms of access to limited public resources also vary within Europe. These are major findings from the participative research undertaken by members of the AI FORA – Artificial Intelligence for Assessment project, which were published recently in an online open access volume.

A new study from the Research Centre for Child Psychiatry at the University of Turku in Finland screened school-age children for anxiety and examined the efficacy of the Master Your Worries programme developed for treating anxiety among children. The study found that the programme reduced children's symptoms of generalised anxiety, social anxiety, and separation anxiety. The study also found that lighter, fully digital study material can reduce anxiety symptoms in children.