Final answer:
H.M. would have the greatest difficulty answering questions about recent events due to his anterograde amnesia, particularly, what he ate for breakfast this morning.
Step-by-step explanation:
The student's question pertains to Henry Molaison, widely known as H.M., who had severe memory deficits following brain surgery to remove his hippocampus and amygdala in an attempt to control his seizures. As a consequence of the surgery, H.M. experienced profound anterograde amnesia, which affected his ability to form new explicit (declarative) memories but did not significantly alter his procedural memory. This means H.M. would have the greatest difficulty with tasks requiring the recall of newly learned episodic or semantic information.
Based on this understanding, H.M. would have the greatest difficulty answering questions about what he ate for breakfast this morning. His ability to form new episodic memories of daily events was impaired. Information like his first grade teacher's name or his childhood home address would likely remain intact, as these are past memories that would have been consolidated before his surgery. Basic factual information such as the number of days in the month of June would also likely be preserved since this semantic memory does not require recent learning or recall of new events.
Therefore, the correct answer is: d. what he ate for breakfast this morning.