Deja Vu: The Feeling That You’ve Been Here Before

Most of us have experienced this strange feeling of being somewhere before or experienced something before even though it is totally new. This feeling is called Déjà vu which when translated in French, literally means “already seen.”

This feeling known as Déjà Vu can occur at any time and to people of all ages.  However, teenagers and young adults in the age group of fifteen and twenty five years are the most likely to experience it. Research estimates that 60 to 70% of the population would have experienced this phenomenon at one time or the other. This phenomenon is also popularly experienced by those who have an active imagination, who are able to recall dreams, who travel and those with higher education and income levels.

There are more than 40 theories to supports the possible causes of this phenomenon. They can be categorized as– déjà vu that has a Biological cause such as the connection between individuals with temporal lobe epilepsy and déjà vu, and Associative causes where in one of your five senses triggers this feeling.

Scientists, physicians other professionals have studied this phenomenon. But it is not easy to come to conclusion as you cannot objectively measure or quantify feelings. Those who study the phenomenon can only depend on personal anecdotes for conducting their research.

Though there is no simple answer or explanation for this strange phenomenon or what causes it, a few explanations that researchers and experts have come up with in the past hundred years or so can throw some light on it.

Dual Processing (Delayed Vision) theory: This theory was put forward in 1963 by Robert Efron. He believed that delay in neurological response causes this phenomenon. Information enters the brain in different ways. Because of this, it is possible that information coming into the brain might not “synchronize” correctly. In other words, information is received and processed in the brain by one route, and then milliseconds later the same information is processed again and this “repeat” of receiving the information might be the cause of the feeling of Déjà Vu.

Outside sources: The “memories” that we think we are experiencing are actually from sources outside ourselves may be from the books we have read, movies we have watched, and pictures we have seen. We experience these things and push it back into our minds and it comes back again later as “memories” that we think we have experienced.

Reincarnation:  The feeling of déjà vu is also believed to be experiences we’ve had in our past life. Reincarnation is the belief that an individual is reborn after death. While the person gets a new body, some of the experiences and memories accompany them to their present life as well. Déjà vu is caused by these memories that follow the person.

Precognitive Dreams: Some researchers think that dreams are the source of Déjà Vu. A person would have had a dream then he experiences the same thing in real thereby giving the feelings of being there before.

The Hologram Theory: This theory was proposed by a Dutch psychiatrist Hermon Sno. According to this theory, memories are like holograms. A person can recreate an entire image from a fragment of a whole. Sno believed that Déjà Vu happens when some detail in our current situation related to sight, taste, smell, sound, touch is similar to a memory in our past allowing the brain to create an entire scene from this small detail.

As already stated people’s feeling are subjective and hence is very difficult to arrive at a concrete conclusion or satisfying explanation. It may take years to establish why this actually occurs and what causes it.