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It’s easy to judge or assign blame in the case of yet another death of a child that’s been forgotten behind in a locked and hot car, but that doesn’t change the fact that it happens. And will continue to do so.
So far, 21 children have died this year in hot cars in the U.S. alone. Despite warnings from the police and advocacy groups, parents and caregivers continue to leave behind infants and toddlers, sometimes with tragic consequences.
How does it happen? How is it possible for a loving, attentive, dedicated parent to forget that their child was with them in the vehicle, to leave for work and return 8 hours later to a dead body?
There is actual science behind it, neuroscientist David Diamond, psychology professor at the University of South Florida, tells WRAL. He’s studied the forgotten baby syndrome and says that the real culprit is Autopilot. Simply put, when our brain goes on Autopilot, it overrides conscious awareness, which means we do thinks without even realizing.
“We have a powerful autopilot brain memory system that gets us to do things automatically – and in that process we lose awareness of other things in our mind, including that there's a child in the car,” Diamond explains. “We have a memory system which is very primitive, and it allows us to do things subconsciously, automatically.”
This explains occurrences like leaving home and not remembering if we locked the door, though we do it automatically every single time. It also explains forgetting a child in the car, if the child wouldn’t have normally been there – i.e. if there was change in our daily routine.
The solution would be to use visual reminders that would prompt us to check the backseat. Diamond says we could place a shoe or the lunchbox in the backseat, or the child’s toy in the front with us. Anything that would get us to look before we lock, to force us off Autopilot.
So far, 21 children have died this year in hot cars in the U.S. alone. Despite warnings from the police and advocacy groups, parents and caregivers continue to leave behind infants and toddlers, sometimes with tragic consequences.
How does it happen? How is it possible for a loving, attentive, dedicated parent to forget that their child was with them in the vehicle, to leave for work and return 8 hours later to a dead body?
There is actual science behind it, neuroscientist David Diamond, psychology professor at the University of South Florida, tells WRAL. He’s studied the forgotten baby syndrome and says that the real culprit is Autopilot. Simply put, when our brain goes on Autopilot, it overrides conscious awareness, which means we do thinks without even realizing.
“We have a powerful autopilot brain memory system that gets us to do things automatically – and in that process we lose awareness of other things in our mind, including that there's a child in the car,” Diamond explains. “We have a memory system which is very primitive, and it allows us to do things subconsciously, automatically.”
This explains occurrences like leaving home and not remembering if we locked the door, though we do it automatically every single time. It also explains forgetting a child in the car, if the child wouldn’t have normally been there – i.e. if there was change in our daily routine.
The solution would be to use visual reminders that would prompt us to check the backseat. Diamond says we could place a shoe or the lunchbox in the backseat, or the child’s toy in the front with us. Anything that would get us to look before we lock, to force us off Autopilot.
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