Some children, from a very early age, report memories of lives they claim to have lived before their current one. Coincidence, psychological construction, or a phenomenon yet to be explained? This is the guiding question behind the research work of Jim Tucker, an American child and adolescent psychiatrist, who will be one of the speakers at the 15th “Behind and Beyond the Brain” Symposium of the Bial Foundation.

Over more than six decades, more than 2,500 cases of this kind have been documented in different parts of the world. In his presentation, Tucker will analyse the most frequent patterns in these reports, including detailed descriptions that, in some cases, correspond to real individuals who have already died, sometimes with no apparent connection to the children’s families.

His talk will also explore the different explanatory hypotheses, ranging from psychological and cultural mechanisms to approaches that challenge conventional models of consciousness and memory.

Professor Emeritus of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neurosciences at the University of Virginia, Jim Tucker has devoted his career to the study of consciousness beyond the materialist paradigm, contributing to one of the most controversial and intriguing fields of research on the human mind.