SL - Reliability of cognitive processes - reconstructive memory

Question 1

Bergman and Roediger (1999)

Answer 1

Aim ->
To investigate how and why information changes as it is repeatedly recalled

Method ->
Ppts read the “War of The Ghosts” story and after being read the story twice and after 15 minutes some ppts were tested on the story, all participants were tested on the story a week later, and some ppts were tested after 6 months. Marking was divided into 3 sections: Major distortions (where aspects were changed which changed the meaning of the story), minor distortions (where basic aspects of the story were slightly altered, with no major effect on the story), and accurate aspects (aspects which were true to the story).

Results -> Found that over time the story lost more and more details. Over time the frequency of major distortions remained relatively constant. Found that those who were tested 15 minutes later recalled the story better than those who were not tested 15 minutes later.

Conclusion -> Major distortions remain relatively constant since they mostly occur by changing the story into something more familiar. Stories that are told, especially when not retold often, are prone to distortions when the story is recalled.

Evaluation ->

✔ Useful applications of this research which supports and is supported by this research. For example, witnesses when they are interviewed do not always have exact testimonies.
✔ Supported by Loftus and Palmer (1974)

❌ Low validity -> Story is intentionally confusing and unusual so may not be a true and accurate representation of memory - bad mundane realism. Lab experiment - low ecological validity. Low sample size - low generalizability. Because of these it is difficult to have full trust in these results and apply them to the general population
❌ This study does not exactly explain what and how makes certain aspects of memory change or remain unchanged. So although this study explains that memory does change we are still unsure of why this occurs.

Question 2

Loftus and Palmer (1974)

Answer 2

Aim ->
To investigate whether a question’s phrasing can affect the memory of an event

Method ->
Ppts shown a video of a car crash. After a week, they were asked a question: “Did you see any broken glass when the cars [smashed/hit]”. There was no broken glass in the video.

Results ->
Found that the frequency of ppts who were questioned with the verb “smashed” incorrectly recalled that there was broken glass more than double than those who were questioned with the verb “hit”.

Conclusion ->
A question’s phrasing can affect memory: memory is reconstructive.
Every word has a different schema and this can affect how people think.

Evaluation ->

✔ High validity -> Two experiments were conducted to investigate these results so we can have high trust in these results and conclusions.
✔ Supported by Bergman and Roediger (1999) ~RM~, Bransford and Johnson ~ST~ (1972), Palmer ~ST~ (1975), and Kahneman ~ST~

❌ ethical issues -> distress (protection from harm)
❌ n/s ~ good negative evaluative point

Question 3

Assimilation, sharpening, and leveling

Answer 3

Assimilation -> changing a story to make it more familiar to us.
Sharpening -> adding new information to a story.
Leveling -> loss of information from a story.

Question 4

Reconstructive memory

Answer 4

States that memory is not perfect and is stored in fragments and during recall, these fragments can have distortions (errors).