The Importance Of Early Memory

“Adler, indeed, insisted that the content of the earliest memory was related to the life-style of the individual, which he noted ‘moulded the memories’ themselves” (Adcock and Ross, 1983). In more recent years it has been more widely accepted and acknowledged that early memories may significantly impact the way a person’s behavior develops throughout her lifetime. The early experiences that people remember can have the power to shape their personality as an adult. This section of the paper will discuss several studies to see the varying ways early memories can shape an individual’s personality, along with the importance of early experiences and how they differ from early memories. We all have memories, they make us curious, we all morph our

In the process they are altered and falsified, and are put in the service of later trends….” (Orlofsky and Frank, 1984: 581). Freud’s comment ties into Adler’s insistent notion that the content of the earliest memory is related to the life-style of the individual, they “moulded the memories” themselves.
Early memory analysis has not been used much when psychologically assessing individuals, this is in part due to the lack of widely accepted early memory data collection or scoring methods (Caruso and Spirrison, 1994:517). In 1991, Acklin et al. developed the Early Memory Relationship Scoring System (EMRSS), which is based on “the view that interpersonal relationships form the foundations of personality”(Caruso and Spirrison,

The ego identity status was determined by the standard semi-structured interview and rating manual developed by Marcia And Friedman in 1970. Identity status ratings were based on occupation and religious, political, and sexual ideology and an overall rating of the combined areas. At the end of the identity interview, the subjects were asked to relate their two earliest memories and to indicate the age to which the memory referred (Orlofsky and Frank, 1984). “Two independent rater who were blind to subjects ' identity status scored the memories, using Mayman 's (1968, 1978) five-level rating system. The percentage of agreement for the two raters across the l96 memories was 79%, and the correlation coefficient across the two sets of ratings was .81. Judges also rated whether the memories contained a blend of two or more themes (Orlofsky and Frank, 1984: 583). In Summation, Orlofsky and Frank’s study found that their findings are suggestive of the role that psychosocial development during childhood may play in identity resolution during late adolescence. The early memories technique summarizes the patient’s subjectively experienced history, allowing the assessor and therapist to comprehend the patient’s view of self, other, and their world view (Fowler et al.,