Widespread Mistaken Beliefs About Memory

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/08/110803174742.htm

ScienceDaily (Aug. 4, 2011) — A new survey reveals that many people in the U.S. -- in some cases a substantial majority -- think that memory is more powerful, objective and reliable than it actually is. Their ideas are at odds with decades of scientific research.

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"Our book highlights ways in which our intuitions about the mind are mistaken," Simons said. "And one of the most compelling examples comes from beliefs about memory: People tend to place greater faith in the accuracy, completeness and vividness of their memories than they probably should."

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While studies have shown, for example, that confident eyewitnesses are accurate more often than eyewitnesses who lack confidence, Chabris said, "even confident witnesses are wrong about 30 percent of the time."

Many studies have demonstrated the ways in which memory can be unreliable and even manipulated, Simons said.

"We've known since the 1930s that memories can become distorted in systematic ways," he said. "We've known since the 1980s that even memory for vivid, very meaningful personal events can change over time. For example, (Cornell University psychology professor) Ulric Neisser showed that personal memories for the Challenger space shuttle explosion changed over time, and (University of California professor) Elizabeth Loftus and her colleagues have managed to introduce entirely false memories that people believe and trust as if they had really happened."

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The new findings also have important implications for proceedings in legal cases, the researchers said.

"Our memories can change even if we don't realize they have changed," Simons said. "That means that if a defendant can't remember something, a jury might assume the person is lying. And misremembering one detail can impugn their credibility for other testimony, when it might just reflect the normal fallibility of memory."

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