So, this isn’t news, nor is it science, per se. But I wanted to share here because I was one of those kids from about 2 to 4. As mentioned in the story, it of course all faded thereafter, but I could talk at length about my life in Texas even though I had never been. My parents found it odd but not entirely outside expectations.
Overall, me too. However, I do find it very interesting and there are a number of compelling stories out there.
There’s a YouTuber Kendall Rae who does a video about an individual on this topic, there’s also this channel https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4XCB1NgoJg that has a wide array. IIRC, this one is the one that seems the most famous example.
In many cases I think parents coax the kids. In other cases it could just be kids being weird, likely most of them. But… it does make you wonder, where does that weirdness come from?
Kids are weird, largely because they repeat things they hear without any understanding of the meanings and significance behind the words. So in the cases of past lives, they’re repeating stuff they’ve heard on TV, films, documentaries, etc, and describing images they’ve seen on posters and adverts and book covers. And they talk about it like it’s real because at that age, kids can’t tell the difference between reality and fiction, so it’s all equally real and it all gets blended together in their minds. Then adults read something into it that isn’t really there.