Individuals who have experienced memories of another life are at a significantly higher risk for mental health disorders. (© Bambalino Studio - stock.adobe.com)
In A Nutshell
- Nearly half of Brazilian adults who report past-life memories screened positive for symptoms of depression, anxiety, or PTSD at rates higher than many high-stress groups.
- 71% reported childhood phobias, far above typical rates, with most persisting into adulthood. Some linked fears to how they believed they died in past lives.
- While unusual desires and phobias predicted poorer mental health, spirituality and positive religious coping often improved outcomes, suggesting faith can buffer distress.
JUIZ DE FORA, Brazil — Adults who say they remember previous lives are reporting unusually high levels of mental health disorders at rates far above what is typically seen in the wider public and even in many high-stress professions, according to new research from Brazil.
The national survey of 402 adults found that nearly half screened positive for common mental health symptoms such as depression and anxiety, while almost four in ten showed signs of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). By comparison, past studies of trauma survivors have reported lower levels of PTSD; for example, 17.8% in Gaza, 28.4% in Cambodia, and 37.4% in Algeria. Brazilian firefighters, who regularly face dangerous and traumatic events, showed rates between 3.5% and 12.9%.
The researchers caution that these are screening results, not formal diagnoses, but they emphasize that the unusually high rates deserve closer attention. “These findings suggest that adults who claim [past-life memories] and report phobias and philias in childhood have a higher chance of reporting high levels of depressive and anxiety symptoms,” the authors wrote in their paper published in The International Journal for the Psychology of Religion. “They may be a population in need of mental health care, considering they are more likely to have [common mental disorders].”
Childhood Fears That Never Fade
One of the most striking findings came from participants’ childhoods. An overwhelming 71% said they had unexplained phobias as children compared with about 7.4% in a global research cohort and 12.5% in a Brazilian cohort. Even more striking, 71% of those childhood fears carried into adulthood.
Many linked their fears to how they believed they had died in a past life. One woman who said she had lived in Prussia described panicking as a child whenever she heard planes overhead. She would run inside shouting, “Plane! Run!” and hide under her bed, waiting for an explosion that never came. She later connected the fear to memories of wartime bombardments.
Beyond fears, about 30% of participants reported unusual urges or desires at a very young age, such as cravings for tobacco, alcohol, or even early sexual behaviors. One participant believed she had been a psychopathic man in the 17th century and recalled experiencing desires for tobacco and sex starting at age 4.
Who Reports Past-Life Memories?
The people who reported past-life memories looked very different from Brazil’s population at large. More than half (54.5%) identified as Spiritists, a religion that embraces reincarnation, compared to only about 2% of Brazilians overall. Two-thirds (68%) held college degrees, compared with just 16% of the general Brazilian population. Nearly eight in ten were women, and 93% said they believed in reincarnation.
The memories themselves often began spontaneously in late adolescence or early adulthood, around age 20 on average. They spanned from prehistoric times to the 20th century and across 23 different regions of the world. Most stories described ordinary, often difficult lives filled with hardship, not glamorous pasts. About half of participants (54%) also reported birthmarks or physical marks they believed matched fatal wounds from previous lives.
Faith’s Complicated Role in Mental Health
Religion and spirituality played a double-edged role. On the one hand, unusual childhood desires and lingering phobias strongly predicted worse mental health. On the other, most spiritual practices seemed to protect against poor outcomes.
People who reported higher levels of spiritual practice, forgiveness, and positive religious coping strategies tended to score better on happiness and mental health scales. In contrast, those who used negative religious coping, such as feeling abandoned by God or believing their suffering was divine punishment, had worse mental health.
Having a belief system to make sense of strange experiences may reduce distress, the authors suggest. “We may hypothesize that the lack of a cognitive framework and a social context that accepts and makes sense of past-life memories may explain part of the distress we found in this population,” they wrote.
Interestingly, Spiritism teaches that forgetting past lives is a blessing meant to prevent unnecessary suffering. This suggests the memories were not simply products of religious teaching.
An Overlooked Mental Health Issue
The researchers stress that their work doesn’t prove or disprove the reality of past-life memories. Instead, it highlights a population experiencing unusually high rates of psychological distress.
“To our knowledge, this is the first nationwide survey about past-life memories among adults,” the authors noted. Nearly half of participants said their memories influenced their lives, with more describing negative effects than positive ones.
Whether these memories represent something real or purely psychological, the people who report them are struggling. The authors argue that clinicians should be more aware of the issue and that more research is needed to understand how best to support individuals reporting these experiences.
Disclaimer: This study does not prove or disprove the reality of past-life memories. It relied on self-reported data and psychological screening tools, not clinical diagnoses. The findings highlight a need for more research into the mental health of people who report these experiences. Readers should interpret the results cautiously.
Paper Summary
Methodology
An online survey conducted between March 2019 and March 2021 recruited 402 Brazilian adults who reported past-life memories. Participants answered questions about demographics, past-life memory features, mental health symptoms, happiness, and spirituality using validated screening tools.
Results
- 46% screened positive for symptoms of common mental disorders (CMD)
- 39% screened positive for PTSD symptoms
- 71% reported childhood phobias, with 71% of those persisting into adulthood
- 30% reported unusual childhood desires (“philias”)
- 54% reported birthmarks or defects they linked to fatal wounds in past lives
- Religious/spiritual involvement predicted better mental health, while negative coping predicted worse outcomes
Limitations
Possible selection bias (highly educated sample), cross-sectional design (no cause-and-effect conclusions), cultural specificity, and unknown true prevalence of past-life memories in the wider population.
Funding and Disclosures
This work was supported by the Bial Foundation, Portugal (Grant no. 89/18). The authors reported no potential conflicts of interest. The study was approved by the Ethics Human Research Committee of the Federal University of Juiz de Fora and all participants signed informed consent forms.
Publication Information
Sandra Maciel de Carvalho, Jim Tucker & Alexander Moreira-Almeida (2025): Who Does Report Past-Life Memories? Claimers’ Profile, Religiosity/Spirituality and Impact on Happiness and Mental Health, The International Journal for the Psychology of Religion. DOI: 10.1080/10508619.2025.2521573
The purpose of our existence is to learn from our lives. People run from the unexplained and fear they feel, but that’s not the best way to go about the lessons they are meant to learn. I have always been anxious when water is splashed on my face (my mother said even as an infant, I couldn’t bare for her to clean my face) or I’m in a body of water that goes above my chest. I learned that I drowned in a past life and a recent past life. Understanding that allows me to calm my nervous system down in bodies of water, so I can come face-to-face with it and teach myself that it’s not the water I need to be afraid of…
It’s all about perspective when it comes to people suffering mentally from past lives. Understanding those past lives and why what happened happened can be incredibly empowering and help people in their current life.
For those that believe past lives don’t exist, that’s okay. Even if it is imaginary, it’s the lessons behind those imagined situation/lifetimes that are important.
Memories of past lives are not authentic memories. They are images and thoughts projected into people’s minds by transdimensional beings that recorded the lives of people now dead and transcribed details of their lives in records using tech from their realm. What’s another way to say this? It’s demonic. Another name for this dimension and the transdimensions entities? The spiritual realm and angels and demons. They have been around longer than humans because God created them first. Take note of this: it’s written: every knee will bow and every tounge confess Jesus is Lord, in heaven, on Earth, and under the Earth, to the glory of God. And remember, Jesus said: I am the way the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father but through me. And also; for God so loved the world that He gave His one and only son that whoever believes in Him will not perish but will have eternal life. And in Romans 10:9 it says if you believe in your heart, and confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, you will be saved. If you have not surrendered your life to Jesus yet and cried out to Him for forgiveness and asked him to be Lord of your life, then today is the day. Just do it. You know in your heart it’s time. Yes this is for you.
I took a hypnosis class in South Lake Tahoe and began to remember several past lives. In the next few weeks I had synchronicities supporting those memories. It was not an unpleasant experience at all.
Memories of a past life are just like religious beliefs – evidence of a significant mental illness.
DNA has every memory of every life lived before you. And I mean every life. From the beginning of time on this planet.
“Adults who say they remember previous lives are reporting unusually high levels of mental health disorders at rates far above what is typically seen in the wider public”
Im just going to leave this right here.
Why are the past memories vague and not fully remembered? It does not exist. Everyone who is born is unique with new memories. The past memories are imagined. It is the reason why mental health becomes an issue. You are going crazy to believe the past memories exist when they actually do not. Reincarnation is a man-made religion that is a myth. It does not make you a better person. When you die, you are not coming back as another person and remember the past life. It is a lie to believe in this religion and the mental health problem will end up being the person’s demise.
You are actually never really born, thats just implanted knowledge. Life has been continuous, without any break (death before reproduction), since it first came about. Birth is just a term we use to describe a different form of cellular reproduction. Each individual carries a host of evolved biologically preprogramed cognitions, some of these patterns of thought and behavior, especially trauma, seem to be able to be passed on epigenetically to even the next generation. So, while reincarnation is not possible, it is perhaps possible that memory like patterns are passed on. But, we dont exactly have evidence for this, yet.
Mostly BS. Do the study authors even know with certainty that past lives exist? The study is based on conjecture and not empirical data.
PTSD from past lives???
I’ve got PTSD from my current life, starting with being raised by parents who had PTSD coming from living six years in direct WWII combat areas where countless others died, then dealing with relocation to foreign nations, assimilating and ‘carrying on’ while nobody else cared. Growing up, I heard tragic experiences recounted by my parents and others that, as I got older, were incomprehensible. As a child, I vowed to help people and the world as a grownup and eventually became a doctor. Little did I know that my training and decades of caring for others, including veterans, would lead to witnessing things and being a part of tragedies nobody should experience on a daily basis. I still have nightmares about those lost along the way. I’m retired now, prefer anonymity, get out into nature as much as possible and avoid the shallow insanity that has overtaken the world, concerned that WWIII may be on the horizon. If it happens, let the first bomb land right on me.
People that believe in reincarnation are crazier than average? No stuff, Sherlock.
Memory exists in your DNA, and you are born with them. What do you think instincts are? WHy do you like or dislike things- because you are a collection of past memories. You have never not been here so to speak. And memory exists as a response to stimulus- for example, the girl running from the sound of planes. Fear is necessary for survival, and it can change your DNA- program it for a response to stimulus, some call flight or fight. Psychedelic mushrooms can remove or extinguish the fear marker in your DNA – literally deprogram you from fear.
New age mumbo jumbo, I had a girlfriend who used to think rubbing crystals while listening to the dead was giving her insight to the universe, she also dropped 12 hits of LSD in her lifetime, so… you know.
Fear is not a good emotion to make oneself better. Fear is a destroyer of good inside you. It leads the person to the Dark Side. Fear is conquered when you have Faith, Hope and Love. There is no need for any medicine of any kind if you have Faith, Hope and Love in the one who created you.