Compiling the of False Memory - Annotated Bibliography Example

Annotated Bibliography of False Memory Introduction The psychological problems have huge impact on an individual’s thinking and judgment behavior; false memory syndrome is one of it. It is a condition in which an individual carries certain set of imprecise memories but believe them to be true. There are various reasons of this critical human conditioning. Psychologists have developed therapies for the eradication of this serious problem. The recovered memory therapy is the most significant one. The purpose of this paper is to exemplify false memories occurrence, recovery and therapy in the light of literary articles. The study elucidates the main causes of false memories and its impact on human beings. The research work done by psychologists in this regard holds tremendous connotation and magnitude. The paper will cover all the relevant aspects of false memories along with concise conclusion for better understanding. Article#1: False Memories of Childhood Experiences Source: Hyman, I. E., Husband, T. H., & Billings, F. J. (2006). False memories of childhood experiences, Applied Cognitive Psychology, 9(3), 181-197 The article demonstrates about the impact of guided imagery instructions in recalling memories. The intention remained to deduct the cause of false memories, building in the controlled environments. Participants were asked to describe four events which previously happened in their lives. Hint about four specific events were also given by the experimenters. The knowledge about events was extracted from their parents. Out of those four events, one event was false event created by experimenters for the research work. The participants were asked to develop mental image of the event, if they were unable to retrieve any of the events, false or true. The created mental image was asked to be explained by the participant to the interviewer. The experimentation took place in controlled environment. The participants were asked to recall the event precisely and think quietly for one minute. The false memories creation ratio was dominant in the imagery condition. Retrieval of false memories was quite high in the imagery condition setup. The mental image produced by participants resulted in false memories. Most of the memories which are fallacious come from childhood. People intend to create captivating childhood memories which have no relation with the real life. The source monitoring and memory reconstruction, both are important in the creation of false childhood memories. The article could be cited as an excellent and highly informative source that helps understanding the basic concept of false memories and allows understanding the process associated with the false memory and imagery conditions associated with it. Article#2: The Formation of False Memories Source: Loftus, E. F., & Pickrell, J. E. (1995). The formation of false memories, Psychiatric Annals, 25(12), 720-725 The article argues the major reasons behind the formation of false memories. The experimentation to investigate the structure of false memories produced considerable outcomes. Basically true memories of participant’s past were tried to recall by describing them different scenarios that could have happened. Lost in shopping mall and memories about hospitalization were tried to retrieve. College students were asked to recall their childhood memories and report succinct details. The events asked to recall were hospitalization of fever, getting lost in malls etc. They were also informed about that information about that certain event is also collected from their parents. The stories revealed by students were mostly false. Students thought that the purpose of this research is to compare their memories with their parents. The results obtained from the first interview showed that 84% of the students recall it correctly. The results of second and third interview showed poor results. The fabrication of stories was quite dominant. The result reached beneath 20% accuracy. The boy named Chris was also chose for the experiment. The event of getting lost in the mall was discussed. The scale was developed to remember things. He was re interviewed after few weeks so that he would recall events. The results varied from the previous findings. The first three events described by Chris were true and were fit on the scale. The other events described Chris was false and was created by himself. For instance, initially he reported that person who rescued him was a cool man. The interview after few weeks with Chris brought opposite results, as he declared the rescuer as an old man. Article#3: Individual differences and the creation of false childhood memories Source: Hyman, I. E., & Billings Jr, F. J. (1998). Individual differences and the creation of false childhood memories, Memory, 6(1), 1-20 The article discusses about childhood memories, which are contaminated by the people later on, to lay an impact on the society. Every individual has certain aspiration, dreams and imaginations which evolve to become his false memories. The experimentation was done on the college students. They were asked to inform about their childhood experiences. Parents of those students were asked to provide incident details in the first place. Two experiments took place to check out the validity and reliability of events. Participant was informed about that event is also told by their parents. The first experiment showed that only one participant created false events. The other participant reported the events happenings in true spirit. The second experiment showed that creation of false memories was even more. Those individuals who exemplify the background knowledge deliberately are the ones with highest number of false memories. The background information was provided by the participant to strengthen its claim but the incident told never happened. False memories paradigm ratio is the most in people aged between 12-20 years because their fascination and imagination level is more than other people. The reason of creation false memories is that people wanted to have such events to happen; which would be according to their wishes and desires. Certain myths inside human mind create false memories which do not exist in the real world. Article#4: Creating False Memories Source: Loftus, E. F. (1997). Creating false memories, Scientific American, 277(3), 70-75 The article exemplifies that how false memories play vital role on human personality. Nadean Cool, a nurse was experimented for the creation of false memories. The psychiatrist asked several questions about her past in different settings. Most of the questions encircled around her childhood activities. Different projective techniques were implied to explore memories of Cool. The experiments had massive impact on Cool’s personality. She came up with several false memories. She believed that she was involved in eating babies, was raped, had sex with animals and was forced to murder her friend. The psychiatrist experimented exorcism test on her too. These all experiments on Cool were done without her knowing that she was tested. The results obtained from this research work were that people started to believe what they are actually not after tactical questioning from the other party. Human beings have the tendency to starting believing those things which never happened by discussing them again and again. The experiment on Cool shows that false memories were implanted in her through questioning. Thus the creation of false memories can take place by cross questioning. Later on after realizing that false memories were implanted, Cool sued the psychiatrist. The result which can be deducted from this study is that critical questioning about past can create ambiguous circumstances in human mind through which false memories emerge. Article#5: Creating false memories: Remembering words not presented in lists. Source: Roediger, H. L., & McDermott, K. B. (1995). Creating false memories: Remembering words not presented in lists. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 21(4), 803. The article epitomizes about the false memories syndrome. Experimentation was done in keeping view the J. Deese’s 1959 case study. The rudiments of false recognition and false recalls were dominant. The list of learning prototype was used to conduct the experimentation. The case discusses about two case studies which point up false recalls and recognition. The first study was comprised by a list of twelve words. In those twelve words, one non presented word was added to check out participant’s response. This first recall test produced shocking results as 40% non presented words were recalled. The associates were confidently acknowledged by the group later on. The second experiment brought more appalling results as the recall rate was increased. The words in the list were expanded and the recall rate also reached at 55%. False alarms were produced to check out the response of participants and this brought noteworthy results. The participants started to remember more items of the lists along with false items too. The memory recovery was however increasing. People’s memory increased but recalling those incidents which never happened also was an issue. The chimera of memory was evident after this experimentation. Article#6: Planting False Childhood Memories Source: Pezdek, K., Finger, K., & Hodge, D. (1997). Planting false childhood memories: The role of event plausibility, Psychological Science, 437-441 The article argues about the plantation of false childhood memories into individuals results that people started to believe that those incidents actually happened. The case has two parts. In the first part, experimentation was done on school children of different faith. 29 Catholic and 22 Jew students of a high school were experimented. Three true events and two false events were discussed with the students. The age defined for the occurrence of those events was 8 years. The false events consisted of one Jewish ritual and one Catholic ritual. The descriptions of false and true events were given. The results showed that 7 Catholic students remembered the false catholic ritual while 0 Jew children remembered that event. Similarly the Jewish false event was remembered by 3 Jew children and one Catholic child. Only two individuals were able to recall both fake events. The second experiment described in the case was about 20 associates who read the descriptions of two false and one true event of a relative. One of the false events was set conceivable to determine participant’s response. The two false events showed that the relative was lost in the mall and was receiving enema. False memories resulted in the retrieval of three events. The true event was also not remembered by the participants. The results made it evident that false events can be built by implanting false memories. Article#7: Affect influences false memories at encoding Source: Storbeck, J., & Clore, G. L. (2011). Affect influences false memories at encoding: Evidence from recognition data. Emotion, 11(4), 981 The article illustrates that true memories can be contaminated by the false memories dominance in the human mind. The research work of various psychologists and psychiatrists resulted that false memories are reduced by sad moods. The true memories of an individual can be retrieved when he/ she is distressed or poignant. The study had two objectives: to check out the impact of ‘affect’ on retrieving memories and how much influence ‘affect’ has on the strength of false memories. The word list was used to check out participant’s response from the experimentation. Sad or happy behaviors were tempted before the experiment. The outcomes of this experiment showed that false memories retrieval was very less among the sad participants. The sad behavior was induced before the experiment. This experiment gave precise result that sad or depressed behavior provokes humans to split out the truth. In happy behavior, false information rate was considerably high. False memories were very few in the sad mood. People in heartrending and depressing phase seemed to tell truth while in happy or normal behavior, false memories are higher. The basic rationale deducted from this experiment was that depressing mood of an individual is the right time for asking the truth about something. People tell lies in the happy or normal moods. Stress on human mind forces him to focus and retrieve correct information. Article#8: False memory propensity in people reporting recovered memories of past lives. Source: Meyersburg, C. A., Bogdan, R., Gallo, D. A., & McNally, R. J. (2009). False memory propensity in people reporting recovered memories of past lives. Journal of abnormal psychology, 118(2), 399 The article exemplifies about those people who claim to have lived more than one life. The recall of past life memories was the intention of this experimentation. The recall and recognition DRM paradigm was used for this experiment. Two sets of people were chose: the first set consisted of those people who claimed to have lived more than one life; the second group consisted of those people who believed that they are living only one life, the current one. The second group was of controlled participants. The DRM paradigm was the ultra portal to determine the false memories ratio. The results obtained from this testing reported that people claiming of having lived more than one life have more false memories than the second group. The controlled participants’ false memories were significantly less. The authors took this matter seriously and rechecked the results by using DRM paradigm. People who insisted that the current life is their second, third or fourth life told numerous false stories. The repossession of those false memories confirmed that people outside the laboratory develop unusual thinking prototype which does not exist. Individuals who cannot remember past incidents of their current life can how retrieve memories from their previous life. Certain questions about faiths of people emerged after this experiment. The results showed increased false memories in the people having belief of living more than one life. The article has been found a very relevant and useful source of information for getting detailed information and knowledge about the topic of false memory and different aspects related with it. Conclusion The cases discussed above illustrate that people tend to create false memories due to inevitable reasons. The experimentation done to check the impact of false memories portray that people suffering through depressed or sad moods incline to create less amount of false memories. The basic motive behind several false memories is non achievement of certain human wants and desires. True childhood memories are usually contaminated by false memories. People also happen to recall those events which never happened in their life time. The experimentation done in controlled environment showed that false memories are created lesser in that particular setting. DMR paradigm is the best way to check recall and recognition of a person. Students are found more in remembering false events. This can be due to their age and minimum maturity level. The stories revealed by students mostly roamed around the chronicles of enthrallment and allure. The responsive behavior of mature men also reported false memories. The people claiming to have lived in more than one life have created more false memories. To prove the argument, they keep on propagating unusual fake stories. The structure of false memories can create problems for people in the long run. References Hyman, I. E., Husband, T. H., & Billings, F. J. (2006). False memories of childhood experiences, Applied Cognitive Psychology, 9(3), 181-197. Loftus, E. F., & Pickrell, J. E. (1995). The formation of false memories, Psychiatric Annals, 25(12), 720-725. Hyman, I. E., & Billings Jr, F. J. (1998). Individual differences and the creation of false childhood memories, Memory, 6(1), 1-20. Loftus, E. F. (1997). Creating false memories, Scientific American, 277(3), 70-75. Roediger, H. L., & McDermott, K. B. (1995). Creating false memories: Remembering words not presented in lists. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 21(4), 803. Pezdek, K., Finger, K., & Hodge, D. (1997). Planting false childhood memories: The role of event plausibility, Psychological Science, 437-441. Storbeck, J., & Clore, G. L. (2011). Affect influences false memories at encoding: Evidence from recognition data. Emotion, 11(4), 981. Meyersburg, C. A., Bogdan, R., Gallo, D. A., & McNally, R. J. (2009). False memory propensity in people reporting recovered memories of past lives. Journal of abnormal psychology, 118(2), 399. Read More