When you remember a birthday, do you simply know what happened, or do you travel back and live it again?
16 questions
about 5 min
AMS-16
How it works
1You will answer 16 statements in 4 groups
2Think about how you typically remember your own past
3Rate on a scale from 1–5 how much each statement applies to you
4There are no right or wrong answers – be honest with yourself
The AMS-16 is a self-assessment with its own items, modelled on the methodology of research questionnaires on autobiographical memory (SAM: Palombo et al., 2013; 26 items); the items are written in our own words and informed by published research methods. It is a self-assessment, not a psychometrically validated instrument, and does not replace clinical assessment or diagnosis of SDAM (Severely Deficient Autobiographical Memory).
Self-assessment, not a diagnosis. Mind Atlas helps you reflect on how you experience your inner world. It does not replace medical or psychological advice. Read the disclaimer
Your answers never leave this browser.
Guide
What the autobiographical memory test measures
When you remember your last birthday, do you travel back and live it again, with the room, the voices and the mood? Or do you simply know what happened, like a fact from a book? Both are ways of remembering. Psychologists call the first episodic memory and the second semantic memory.
This test asks about four sides of remembering your own life: reliving events, knowing facts about your past, finding your way through places you know, and imagining your future. It follows the approach of research on autobiographical memory, including the study that described SDAM (Palombo et al. 2015), with 16 items of its own.
Four sides of remembering
Reliving, or episodic memory, means travelling back in time: you see, hear and feel a past moment again from your own point of view. Knowing, or semantic memory, covers facts about your life, such as where you went to school or what happened on a trip, without reliving them. Finding your way is the inner map of places you know, from your home to the route to work. Imagining the future means picturing events that have not happened yet, such as next summer's holiday.
The four sides do not have to go together, as the studies below show: someone can know their life story well and still relive very little of it. Your result therefore shows each side separately.
When remembering feels like knowing
Palombo et al. (2015) described three healthy, high-functioning adults with a lifelong severely deficient autobiographical memory (SDAM). They could not vividly relive personal events from a first-person perspective, yet their learning and memory were otherwise intact and they functioned normally in daily life. Brain recordings supported what they reported.
Memory and imagery are connected. In Dawes et al. (2020), people with aphantasia reported less vivid and less detailed memories of their own life and of imagined future events than people with imagery, while their spatial abilities appeared unaffected. Zeman et al. (2020) also found that people with aphantasia more often report difficulties with autobiographical memory.
How to read your result
The test describes how you experience remembering, not how accurate your memory is. Someone who relives little can still know a great deal about their past. The bands are orientation only, since this is a new self-assessment that has not been validated.
It is not a diagnosis. If your memory has changed noticeably, or everyday forgetting worries you, please talk to a doctor rather than relying on a questionnaire.
Questions and answers
What is SDAM?
+
Severely deficient autobiographical memory: a lifelong pattern in which people know facts about their past but can hardly relive it. Palombo et al. (2015) first described it in three healthy adults who otherwise lived normal lives.
Does this test measure how good my memory is?
+
No. It asks how you experience remembering: how much you relive, know, find your way and imagine ahead. It does not check whether your memories are correct.
Is weak reliving linked to aphantasia?
+
Often, but not always. On average, people with aphantasia report less vivid memories of their own life (Dawes et al. 2020; Zeman et al. 2020). Your visual region and this region together show how the two relate for you.
Sources
Palombo DJ, Alain C, Söderlund H, Khuu W, Levine B (2015). Severely deficient autobiographical memory (SDAM) in healthy adults: A new mnemonic syndrome. Neuropsychologia 72:105–118. doi:10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2015.04.012
Dawes AJ, Keogh R, Andrillon T, Pearson J (2020). A cognitive profile of multi-sensory imagery, memory and dreaming in aphantasia. Scientific Reports 10:10022. doi:10.1038/s41598-020-65705-7
Zeman A, Milton F, Della Sala S, et al. (2020). Phantasia – The psychological significance of lifelong visual imagery vividness extremes. Cortex 130:426–440. doi:10.1016/j.cortex.2020.04.003
Peer-reviewed studies. Figures are quoted as reported there; your result comes from a self-assessment that has not been validated.
Who makes Mind Atlas
Mind Atlas (mymindatlas.org) is a service by the agency headon. The tests are self-assessments with our own questions and tasks, built on the published research methods listed above. They have not been validated and do not diagnose anything. Your result is calculated in this browser; your answers are not sent to any server.