Lecture 15: Sins of Memory Flashcards
What are the three main types of episodic memory errors?
- Schema and Gist Errors: Relying on prior knowledge, leading to distorted recall.
- Misattribution Errors: Attributing a memory to the wrong source.
- Misinformation Errors: Memory distorted by post-event information.
What is the DRM memory illusion, and how was it studied?
- Roediger & McDermott (1995) found participants falsely recalled critical lures (e.g., related words not presented).
- Methodology: Behavioral experiments using semantically related word lists. Errors occurred due to reliance on gist memory.
What did Koutstaal & Schacter (1997) discover about gist memory for pictures?
Participants falsely recognized lure images ~20% of the time.
* Methodology: Behavioral recognition tests using categorized picture stimuli.
What did Bartlett’s (1932) War of the Ghosts study reveal about schema reliance?
Participants distorted unfamiliar stories to fit schemas during recall.
* Methodology: Behavioral study tracking recall distortions over repeated retrievals.
How did Brewer & Treyens (1981) demonstrate schema-consistent memory errors?
Participants falsely recalled schema-consistent objects absent from a graduate office.
* Methodology: Recognition memory tasks in a controlled office setting.
What is source monitoring, and how does it affect memory?
Source monitoring refers to distinguishing between real and imagined events. Failures lead to misattributions. Source Monitoring Theory (Johnson et al., 1993).
* Methodology: Experimental tasks assessing memory for source details.
What is cryptomnesia, and how does it occur?
Cryptomnesia (unconscious plagiarism) occurs when source monitoring fails.
How did Schacter et al. (2011) demonstrate imagination inflation?
Found imagining events increased false memory formation.
* Methodology: Experimental tasks involving vivid imagination and subsequent memory tests.
What is the misinformation effect?
Memory is distorted by misleading post-event information. Loftus & Palmer (1974).
* Methodology: Participants viewed a car crash video and were asked questions with varying terms (e.g., “smashed” vs. “hit”). Results showed altered recall of speed and broken glass based on question phrasing.
How did Geiselman et al. (1985) develop the cognitive interview?
Designed to reduce memory errors in eyewitness testimony.
* Stages: Reinstate context, recall events in reverse order, report everything, and describe events from another perspective.
* Methodology: Applied memory research to real-life eyewitness interviews.
What did Allport & Postman (1947) find about racial bias in memory recall?
Stereotypes distorted memory in a “telephone game”-style task.
* Methodology: Behavioral task tracking how recall became increasingly stereotype-driven.
How did Kleider et al. (2008) study stereotype-driven errors?
Found gender stereotype errors increased with time delays.
* Methodology: Behavioral experiments assessing memory accuracy over time.
What did Murphy et al. (2019) find about fake news memory?
Participants remembered 48% of fake stories, especially those aligning with personal views.
* Methodology: Online study of 3,140 participants testing memory for real vs. fake stories during Ireland’s 2018 abortion referendum.
How do true and false memories differ neurally, according to Dennis et al. (2012)?
True recollection showed greater activation in the right hippocampus and visual cortex compared to false recollection.
* Methodology: fMRI study comparing neural activation during retrieval.
What did Kurkela & Dennis (2016) conclude about neural differences between true and false memories?
Meta-analysis found no consistent neural differences between true and false memories.
* Methodology: Meta-analysis of fMRI studies.
