Forgetting and Mental Travel

We forget things every day, mostly without meaning to. Bills, keys, birthdays. It's usually just annoying. But forgetting isn't always a failure of memory. Often it's functional.

When you check out of a hotel, you don't need to remember the room number anymore. Letting it go declutters your mind for what's next. In an age of constantly rotating passwords, forgetting the old ones is useful, not embarrassing. And in more serious cases, like intrusive or unwanted memories, the ability to reduce a memory's grip on us can be protective rather than pathological.

One of the clearest ways this shows up is through context. When we try to remember something in a context different from the one in which we learned it, forgetting often results. This happens with physical environments, but also with internal, psychological ones. Our lab was the first to show that changes in mental context, such as shifts in the thoughts we're experiencing, can themselves cause forgetting.

Through imagination and by thinking of things that are not here and now, we can mentally transport ourselves to a different time or place, whether that's the past, an imagined future, or simply somewhere other than the current moment. This kind of mental travel is itself a form of control. By shifting where our mind is, we shift what it holds onto and what it lets go of. We study how this control over mental context shapes memory, and forgetting in particular.

In other words, remembering isn't always the goal, and forgetting isn't always the flaw. Our lab studies how people exert control over memory, including how unwanted memories are suppressed or forgotten, and what role executive control and context play in that process.