Takes months or years and is the gradual restructuring of neural circuits in the brain.

University of Michigan - Ann Arbor

- Synaptic consolidation (late-phase long-term potentiation)
- Systems consolidation
- Reconsolidation

Memory consolidation processes

Goldstein, E. B. (2014). Cognitive psychology: Connecting mind, research and everyday experience. Nelson Education.


Takes minutes or hours and causes structural changes to the synapses.

After a memory is retrieved, it becomes fragile again. Thus before it is put back into long-term memory it must be consolidated once again.