Some basic observations challenge the researcher trying to understand the structure of autobiographical memory. Autobiographical memory shares properties with all human memory. It is highly organized. It tends to preserve the general gist of events, or series of events, but usually not the details. It is vast, requiring search and decision for retrieval. In addition, autobiographical memory presents problems that memory theorists trying to explain most phenomena can often safely ignore. First, autobiographical memory is memory for a whole lifetime and, as such, memories have much longer times than usual to change, distort, and be reconstructed. Second, this long passage of time is confounded with the development of the rememberer so that a college sophomore may be asked to recall an event encoded by a 6-year-old. Third, autobiographical memory is important affectively. It is the sum of peoples' knowledge of their own lives and as such is the basis for their concept of self.

This section presents diverse approaches to exploring the organization of autobiographical memory. On the one hand, the scope of evidence and theory is widened to include literary criticism of autobiographies, social psychology, personality theory, and development. On the other, the classification of a sample of autobiographical memories is used to specify a model that attempts to define the nebulous term schema in enough detail so that even a machine could understand it.