The Science of Nostalgia

   Nostalgia is the very feeling that wraps you up in a shroud of memories obscured and distorted by a rosy, idealised version of the past. The dictionary definition of nostalgia is a 'sentimental longing or wistful affection for a period in the past' and almost everybody has had this distinct feeling. Rosy retrospective, reminiscence, even Freud's theory of screen memory all describe a similar event in our minds in which a memory is glossed over with other past memories to filter or screen out any negative recollection of an event.

   Nostalgia, as currently theorised, is caused by a certain emotional state that we associate with a certain time period in our lives and deduct that any concurrent memories must have given us that very same emotion. Usually, hence the common phrase 'rosy retrospective', this memory that is assumed upon a memory is a feeling of happiness and rosy glee.

   Very little conclusions have been made of what role the brain plays in nostalgia but a few clear connections have been made. It is obvious that an emotional connection is made with the role of memory in the brain therefore it is highly likely that the limbic system which includes the hippocampus (responsible for processing and storing memories) and the amygdala (responsible for emotions) play a huge role.

   Different triggers of nostalgia also incorporate different regions and functions of the brain. For example, researchers have found that nostalgia triggered by music shows increased activity in the prefrontal cortex which is activated when autobiographical memories are being retrieved. Nostalgia triggered by smells, which Freud first found to elicit the strongest sense of nostalgia in 1908, may be because of the olfactory bulb which is found right in the limbic system in the brain and processes the data from the sense of smell. This means information from scents hardly has to travel in the brain to reach the stored emotional memories.

   Our brain and emotions can elicit nostalgia so strongly to us that whole years may be contorted to fit our own bias of our past- whether we see that as a positive or a negative in our life is down to us. I had never before considered nostalgia as a branch of false memories but it helps me put into perspective how common they are even day to day in little examples like rosy retrospective.