The idea that people look up and to the left (or any specific direction) when trying to remember something is a popular but debunked notion. This concept is often associated with the pseudoscience of Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP), which claimed that eye movements could reveal a person's thought processes or indicate whether they were accessing visual, auditory, or kinesthetic (feeling-based) memories. However, there is no scientific evidence to support these claims.
In reality, eye movements are not reliable indicators of memory or thought processes. People naturally move their eyes in various directions for many reasons, such as processing visual information, following a conversation, or simply looking around their environment.
Memory is a complex cognitive process involving various brain regions and neural connections. How someone recalls or accesses memories is not directly related to the direction of their eye movements. Memories can be triggered by various stimuli, such as verbal cues, sensory experiences, or associations with past events, without any consistent eye movement patterns.
While NLP gained popularity in the 1970s and 1980s, it has been largely discredited by the scientific community. As a result, the idea of using eye movements to decipher a person's thoughts or memory processes is not supported by valid scientific research.
It's essential to approach such claims with critical thinking and rely on evidence-based scientific research when studying memory, cognition, and human behavior.