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Storing events to retell them

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 October 2007

Jean-Louis Dessalles
Affiliation:
ParisTech, Ecole Nationale Superieure des Telecommunications, F-75013 Paris, France. dessalles@enst.frwww.enst.fr/~jld

Abstract

Episodic memory is certainly a unique endowment, but its primary purpose is something other than to provide raw material for creative synthesis of future scenarios. Remembered episodes are exactly those that are worth telling. The function of episodic memory, in my view, is to accumulate stories that are relevant to recount in conversation.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2007

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