Reconstructive memory - confabulation

Reconstructive memory

a theory that posits that the act of remembering is not a straightforward retrieval of past experiences but rather an active process where memories are reconstructed based on various influences. This includes prior knowledge, beliefs, expectations, and social contexts, which can lead to alterations in how events are recalled.

Confabulation

a memory phenomenon characterized by the unintentional creation of false or distorted memories without the conscious intention to deceive. Individuals who confabulate genuinely believe in the accuracy of their recollections, even when these memories are fabricated or misinterpreted

Types of Confabulation

• Provoked (Momentary): This type occurs in response to specific questions or prompts, often as a way to fill gaps in memory. It is common in individuals with amnesia or dementia.

• Spontaneous (Primary): This form arises without any external cues and is typically involuntary. It is less common and often associated with severe cognitive impairments, such as those seen in certain types of dementia.

leading questions

Elisabeth Loftus to carry out a series of studies that highlighted the problem of leading questions in eyewitness testimony.  Leading questions are questions that either by the form or the content suggest to a witness which answer is desired. (a type of provoked confabulation)

loftus and palmer - aim

• to investigate whether the use of leading questions would affect the estimation of speed

• predicted that using the word ‘smashed’ would result in a higher estimation of speed than using the word ‘hit’.

loftus and palmer - Experiment 1 procedure

• Experiment 1: 45 American college students.

• Task: Participants watched a video of a car crash.

  • Questioning: After viewing, they were asked:

    • "About how fast were the cars going when they [verb] each other?"

  • Verbs Used: Five different verbs were tested:

    • Smashed

    • Collided

    • Bumped

    • Hit

    • Contacted

  • Measurement: Participants estimated the speed based on the verb used.

loftus and palmer - Experiment 1 results

• Speed estimates varied significantly based on the verb:

  • "Smashed" led to higher speed estimates (e.g., 40.5 mph).

  • "Contacted" led to lower estimates (e.g., 31.8 mph).

loftus and palmer - Experiment 2 procedure

• Experiment 2: 150 American college students.

• Task: Participants again watched a video of a car accident.

• Questioning: They were divided into three groups, each asked a different question:

  • Group 1: "How fast were the cars going when they smashed into each other?"

  • Group 2: "How fast were the cars going when they hit each other?"

  • Group 3: No speed question (control group).

• Follow-Up Question: A week later, participants were asked if they saw any broken glass in the video.

loftus and palmer - Experiment 2 results/findings

• Those who heard "smashed" were more likely to report seeing broken glass than those who heard "hit," indicating that the verb influenced their memory of the event.

loftus and palmer - Experiment 1 strengths and weaknesses

strengths:

• confounding variables can be controlled so that it is really the effect of the independent variable that is measured.

Limitations:

• low ecological validity - lab

loftus and palmer - Experiment 2 strengths and weaknesses

Limitations:

• lacking ecological validity and therefore it may be difficult to generalize the findings to real life. The comments made on the first experiment also apply to the second one.

Yuille and Cutshall (counter) - aim

to see if leading questions would affect the memory of eyewitnesses at a real crime scene.

Yuille and Cutshall (counter) - Event

• The crime scene was in Vancouver.

•  The thief entered a gun shop and tied up the owner before stealing money and guns from the shop. 

• The owner freed himself, and thinking that the thief had escaped, went outside the shop.

• The thief was still there and shot him twice.

• police had been called and there was gunfire - and the thief was eventually killed.

•  As the incident took place in front of the shop, there were eyewitnesses - 21 were interviewed by the police.​

Yuille and Cutshall (counter) - Procedure

• Longitudinal study of the 21 witnesses

• The researchers contacted the eyewitnesses four months after the event. 

• 13 of the eyewitnesses agreed to be interviewed as part of a study. They gave their account of the incident, and then they were asked questions. 

• Two leading questions were used：

  • Half the group was asked if they saw a broken headlight on the getaway car. ​

  • The other half was asked if they saw a yellow panel on the car (the panel was actually blue). ​

  • They were also asked to rate their stress on a seven-point scale.​

Yuille and Cutshall (counter) - Findings

• Found that eyewitnesses were actually very reliable. ​

• They recalled a large amount of accurate detail that could be confirmed by the original police reports. ​

• They also did not make errors as a result of the leading questions and those who were most distressed by the situation had the most accurate memories.​

Yuille and Cutshall (counter) - strengths

• stronger ecological validity in comparison to Loftus & Palmer's laboratory study, because they had actually witnessed a crime

• archival evidence (police records of the original testimonies) to confirm the accuracy of the testimonies.

Yuille and Cutshall (counter) - Limitations

• Loftus and Palmer's study has a higher level of reliability.  Yuille and Cutshall's study is not replicable and also not generalizable since it was a one-off incident

• no control of variables, so it is difficult to know the level of rehearsal that was used by the different eyewitnesses. It could be that those who agreed to be in the study had spent the most time thinking and reading about the case.

reconstructive memory “eval”

• may very well be that different types of memory are more reliable than others. As we saw in the case study of HM, although he had lost his declarative memories, he was still able to learn procedural memories. This clearly indicates that different memories may be located in different parts of the brain - and that they also may have different levels of reliability

• Applicability in eye witness testimony in courts