How is memory constructed
- knowledge, experiences, expectations
-Construction is adaptive because we can often get details right without having to encode them (I don’t remember how I behaved in that particular situation, but I always do X when Y, so I must have done that in this situation too)
Familiarity and/ or fluency
Two misleading sources of information
- ex. circling an answer on an exam because it seems familiar enough that you think it was discussed in class
Bartlett’s ‘War of the Ghosts’ experiment
Participants attempt to remember a story. Then engaged in repeated production (telephone) and repeated the story to other people. Each retwlling became shorter and more inaccurate. Changes were introduced that were inconsistent with the story. Maybe added cultural things from indigenous culture becuase it was an indigenous story
Source memory
determining the origins of our memories
- Did a person tell you that, where were you?
Source monitoring error
misidentifying the source of a memory (source misattributions)
Cryptoamnesia
Unconscious plagiarism of another person’s work due to a lack of recognition of the original source
Pragmatic inferences
-Based on knowledge gained through experience
-memory can be influenced by inferences that people make based on their experiences
(Do you believe in Ghosts? imply they are scared)
Schema
Knowledge of some aspect of our environment (birds have a beak, feathers, wings, talons)
Script
conception of sequence of actions that usually occurs during a particular experience (going to a restaurant, playing tennis)
False memories
Memory can include info not actually experienced but inferred because it is consistent with the schema
-Participants said there were books in an office they were in, even though there weren’t any
Crime narrated by a female voice experiment
Difficult group: heard a female voice, then had a second narration of the same story, some details changed, then tested 2 days later
Easy group: waited 2 days, then heard a male voice, some details changed, then tested immediately
Results of Crime narrated by female experiement
Difficult conditions made more source monitoring errors
- Due to the difference in timing and distinctiveness of voice, reading second narration
Misinformation effect
Misleading information presented after a memory is formed can change how that memory is remembered later
Traffic accident experiement
- participants saw slides of a
traffic accident involving a stop sign
-Misleading post-event information (MPI) was introduced (yield sign mentioned in questionnaire completed after viewing)
Traffic accident experiment results
Participants remembered what they read (yield sign) not what they saw (Stop sign)
Traffic accident verb experiment
Participants estimated the speed for the crash was higher when they were presented with a verb like smashed rather than contacted
