Control of Memory & Forgetting Lab

The Control of Memory & Forgetting Lab explores one of the most captivating questions about the human mind: how do we decide what to keep, and what to let go? Memory isn’t a dusty archive of the past. It’s a living system that bends to our goals, emotions, and experiences. And forgetting, so often dismissed as a flaw, is one of the brain’s most powerful tools, clearing mental clutter, loosening the grip of unwanted experiences, and keeping us locked onto what matters now. By studying the push and pull between remembering and forgetting, we’re uncovering how the brain strikes this delicate balance and why it’s essential for learning, resilience, and well-being.

We dig into how these processes unfold in the mind and brain. What lets us deliberately pull up one memory while a competing one fights for access? How does cognitive control decide which memories grow strong and which fade? What roles do attention and executive function play in sculpting memory over time? To find out, we attack these questions from every angle: the mental operations involved, their neural signatures, their moment-by-moment time course, and the computational principles that explain how memory competition gets resolved. Our work lives at the crossroads of memory, attention, and cognitive control, built on a simple idea: forgetting isn’t the enemy of remembering, but its partner, part of a single system that keeps memory useful, flexible, and adaptive in a changing world. Whether you study cognitive psychology, neuroscience, or computation, we’d love to hear from you. Questions, collaborations, and curiosity are always welcome.