The most interesting information I've learned during this course

"The most interesting information I've learned during this course"

Memory is a vital cognitive process, primarily responsible for the encoding, storage and retrieval of the preserved information. (Colman; 2015,) Unfortunately, when it comes to such intricate processes nothing is infallible — memory is no exception. During this course we have not only explored the basics of mnemonic functions, but also touched briefly on a phenomenon known as “false memory”. According to The Oxford Dictionary of Psychology, a false memory can be defined as “an apparent recollection of something that one did not actually experience” (Colman; 2015). Contrary to popular belief, false memories are rather common: examples range from such mundane things as falsely remembering closing the front door to much more impactful errors like incorrectly recollecting perpetrator’s features during a testimony. Taking this in consideration, the importance of the research centered around false memories can not be exaggerated.

There is a wide variety of factors which may cause the appearance of false memories. One of them is a misinformation effect. A number of studies has shown that the contamination of memory can be caused by exposure to erroneous information after one has witnessed an event. In those studies, misinformation was usually presented is a form of a misleading question. In early experiments held by Loftus, Miller and Burns (1978), subjects remembered seeing a car passing by a yield sign instead of a stop sign if prior to this they were asked “How fast was the car traveling when it passed the yield sign?”. (p. 19) During the subsequent studies people were led to incorrectly remember everything from crucial details of a perpetrator’s appearance to objects as large as a barn. (Frenda et al., 2011, p. 20-23; Loftus, 2005, p. 361-366)

Another factor that plays a significant role in false memory formation is schema-consistent events. Our memory systems take advantage of the recurring patterns by forming and using schematas. While useful in day-to-day life, the reliance on such mechanisms can cause recalling schema-consistent information regardless of its presence (Brainerd CJ. & Reyna, 2005). An example of a study, examining an effect schemas have on memory errors — experiments held by Lampinen, Copeland and Neuschatz (2001, p. 1211). After a 48-hour delay from the visit to the office, subjects were twice more likely to falsely recall objects typical to the location.

Other aspect of false memories — mood. It was speculated, that positive and negative mood influenced the false memory effect. As a result of a study conducted by Storbeck and Clore (2005), it was proven that individuals in negative moods were significantly less likely to show false memory effects than those in positive moods or those whose mood was not manipulated (p. 785-791). The acquired data also suggests that moods influence the accessibility of lures at encoding, rather than influencing monitoring at retrieval.

Even though this phenomenon has been a focus of attention for researchers for decades, there are still a lot of questions left unanswered. One of the key topics being addressed in current false memory research is whether it could be possible to differentiate between false memories and true memories. (Laney C., Loftus E. F, 2013) To this day no firm distinguishing characteristic between the two has yet been established. Thus, further research is called for.

In conclusion, knowledge of false memory phenomenon has a wide specter of applications in psychology. First and foremost, there is data suggesting an interesting pattern: in early 1990s patients with depression would develop memories for violent victimhood over the course of the therapy (Loftus & Ketcham, 1994). Even though these patients’ therapists claimed that the recovered memories of childhood abuse were genuine, some experimental psychologists believe that the memories were instead created in therapy. In order to provide their services efficiently, therapists need to take false memories effects into account, so necessary precautions are taken to avoid them. It is also important to take into consideration memory’s susceptibility to manipulation during the processes of designing and conducting experiments, which in any shape rely on person’s ability to recall information. The reason lies in how easily misinformation effects can occur: for instance, during one of the studies subjects were more likely to say yes when asked “Did you see the broken headlight?” than when asked “Did you see a broken headlight?” (Loftus, 1975, p. 560-572).

Academic references:

1. Brainerd, C. J., & Reyna, V. F. (2005). The science of false memory. Oxford University Press.

2. Colman, A. M. (2015). A dictionary of psychology. Oxford Quick Reference.

3. Frenda, S. J., Nichols, R. M., & Loftus, E. F. (2011). Current issues and advances in misinformation research. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 20(1), 20-23.

4. Laney, C., Loftus E. F. (2013). Recent advances in false memory research.

5. Lampinen, J. M., Copeland, S. M., & Neuschatz, J. S. (2001). Recollections of things schematic: Room schemas revisited. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 27(5), 1211.

6. Loftus, E. F. (2005). Planting misinformation in the human mind: A 30-year investigation of the malleability of memory. Learning & memory, 12(4), 361-366.

7. Loftus, E. F. (1975). Leading questions and the eyewitness report. Cognitive psychology, 7(4), 560-572.

8. Loftus, E. F., Ketcham, K. (1994). The myth of repressed memory. New York, NY: St. Martin’s Press.

9. Loftus, E. F., Miller, D. G., & Burns, H. J. (1978). Semantic integration of verbal information into a visual memory. Journal of experimental psychology: Human learning and memory, 4(1), 19.

10. Storbeck, J., & Clore, G. L. (2005). With sadness comes accuracy; with happiness, false memory: Mood and the false memory effect. Psychological Science, 16(10), 785-791.

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