Neuroimaging studies have reported activation in ventrolateral (Brodmann's Areas 44, 45, 47, and parts of 6), dorsolateral (Brodmann's 9 and parts of 46), and anterior (Brodmann's Areas 10 and parts of 46) prefrontal cortex during episodic long-term memory. The medial temporal lobe including the hippocampal formation (dentate gyrus, hippocampus, and entorhinal cortex), the perirhinal and parahippocampal cortices, and the amygdale play significant role in episodic memory. fMRI studies show strong blood flow in the right ventral prefrontal cortex during recall of episodic material. This activation extends partly towards the medial limbic regions. Greater activation in the left prefrontal cortex has been recorded during source memory judgments.

Studies of brain-damaged patients have also helped in understanding the locus of various memory functions in the brain. Neuropsychological studies comparing normal controls, frontal lobe damaged and amnesic patients revels no difference between the two patient groups. As compared to the normal controls both the patient groups could recall the same amount of factual knowledge. However, they suffer impairment of source memory performance. As frontal cortex is also sensitive to aging, source memory discrepancies can also appear due ageing. Damage to the medial temporal lobe (peri-and entorhinal cortex, parahippocampal gyrus), medial diencephalon (mediodorsal and anterior thalamic nuclei and mammillary bodies), and basal forebrain (cholinergic nuclei of the medial septal region, basal nucleus of Meynert and the diagonal band of Brocas' region) causes loss of information from episodic memory. Studies of brain damaged patients indicate that damage to the right hemisphere causes loss of episodic memory whereas damage to the left hemisphere results into loss of semantic memory.

As discussed above, explicit memory is classified into semantic and episodic memories. Autobiographical memory is a sub-classification of episodic memory. Looking at them from neuropsychological perspective, limbic system is instrumental in encoding autobiographical and semantic memory. Orbitofrontal and anterolateral temporo-polar regions are involved in the retrieval of information. Increased connectivity between the parahippocampal cortex and hippocampus has been observed during retrieval of autobiographical events. Retrieval of general knowledge has shown increased connectivity between the middle temporal gyrus and temporal pole (Maguire et al., 2000). PET studies show that the right hemisphere engages in retrieval of episodic memory, whereas the left hemisphere is involved in retrieval from the semantic memory. Regions of the fronto-temporal junction area perform these operations.