First Published in 2003. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

How we think of ourselves depends largely on what we remember from our lives, and what we remember is biased in many ways by how we think of ourselves. The complex interplay of the self and memory is the topic of this volume.

This book traces the developmental, social, cultural, and historical origins of the autobiographical self - the self that is made of memories of the personal past and of the family and the community. It combines rigorous research, compelling theoretical insights, sensitive survey of real memories and memory conversations, and fascinating personal anecdotes to convey a message: the autobiographical self is conditioned by one's time and culture.

Our memories, many believe, make us who we are. But most of our experiences have been forgotten, and the memories that remain are often wildly inaccurate. How, then, can memories play this person-making role? The answer lies in a largely unrecognized type of memory: Rilkean memory.

Reviews and integrates the many theories, perspectives and approaches in the field of autobiographical memory.

Autobiographical memory is constituted from the integration of several memory skills, as well as the ability to narrate. This all helps in understanding our relation to self, family contexts, culture, brain development, and traumatic experiences. The present volume discusses contemporary approaches to childhood memories and examines cutting-edge research on the development of autobiographical memory. The chapters in this book written by a group of leading authors, each make a unique contribution by describing a specific developmental domain. In providing a multinational and multicultural perspective on autobiographical memory development—and by covering a variety of theoretical and methodological approaches, this state-of-the-book is essential reading on the autobiographical memory system for memory researchers and graduate students. It is also of interest to scholars and students working more broadly in the fields of cognitive, developmental, and social psychology, and to academics who are conducting interdisciplinary research on neuroscience, family relationships, narrative methods, culture, and oral history.

Providing an unusual perspective on self and social memory different from the norm in social cognitive research, this volume describes the results of the authors' diary research now in progress for more than 15 years. It investigates the topic of autobiographical memory through longitudinal studies of graduate students' diaries. Recalled and examined in this volume, a recent collection of several long-term diaries -- spanning up to two-and-one-half years in length -- replicated and significantly extended the authors' earlier knowledge of autobiographical memory. These studies are analyzed for commonalities and differences within the entire body of their data. Organized by the major themes suggested by the authors' theoretical views, this volume will be significant to students and researchers of both memory in general, and personal or episodic memory in particular.