The feeling of deja vu is undoubtedly known to virtually everybody. It's that sensation that people have when they find themselves in a certain place or situation, and they feel like they've been there before, or done the same thing before. Psychologists and behavior experts have attempted countless explanations for this occurrence, ranging from brain dysfunctions to out-of-body experiences. None has been able to explain exactly how deja vu occurs.

 

Recently, US scientists from the Colorado State University, led by psychologist Anne M. Cleary, published a study in the Association for Psychological Science's journal, Current Directions in Psychological Science, arguing that deja vu can be linked to recognition memory. This portion of human memory deals primarily with identifying and recognizing events, people and places, thus allowing us to know that we have met someone or been to a certain place before.

 

Currently, researchers know of two types of recognition memories – recollection and familiarity. The first allows the brain to identify people, for example, whom we don't know, but see in two different places. It allows us to say that we saw those people in the subway, or in the bakery shop. The second type of memory makes a situation seem familiar to us, without our brains being able to tell why this is happening.

 

"Many parallels between explanations of deja vu and theories of human recognition memory exist. Theories of familiarity-based recognition and the laboratory methods used to study it may be especially useful for elucidating the processes underlying deja vu experiences," Cleary says.

 

Thorough research, conducted on test subjects at the University, showed that people's familiarity-recognition memory could be linked to the appearance of deja vu, although even Cleary admits that more investigation is required in the area. The truth is that the brain works in such mysterious ways that cracking them may just take a little while longer.