Out-of-body memory encoding causes third-person perspective at recall

Sigmund Freud famously noted some memories are recalled with a perspective of “an observer from outside the scene”. According to Freud—and most memory researchers today—the third-person occurs due reconstructive processes at recall. An alternative possibility is that have been adopted when actual event experienced and later in its original form. Here we test this hypothesis using perceptual out-of-body illusion during encoding real events. Participants took part social interaction while experiencing an where they viewed their own body perspective. In recall sessions ∼1 week later, events encoded compared in-body control condition were significantly less first-person experience leads more recollection.