ACCURACY AND INACCURACY IN MEMORY AND COGNITION

Accuracy and Inaccuracy in Memory and Cognition

• Learning Objectives:1. Outline the variables that can influence the accuracy of our memory for events.2. Explain how schemas can distort our memories.3. Describe the representativeness heuristic and the availability heuristic and

explain how they may lead to errors in judgment.

Accuracy and Inaccuracy in Memory and Cognition

Accuracy and Inaccuracy in Memory and Cognition

Accuracy and Inaccuracy in Memory and Cognition

Accuracy and Inaccuracy in Memory and Cognition

Source Monitoring: Did It really Happen?

• Source monitoring– The ability to accurately identify the source of a memory– Source monitoring errors are more likely to occur among fantasy-prone

individuals, children, and the elderly.• Sleeper effect

– Attitude change that occurs over time as we forget the source of information

Schematic Processing: Distortions Based on Expectations

• Confirmation bias– the tendency to verify and confirm our existing memories rather than challenge

and disconfirm them• The confirmation bias contributes to the persistence of stereotypes and to a failure to

“think outside the box” during problem solving.

Schematic Processing: Distortions Based on Expectations

• Functional fixedness– Schemas prevent people from

using an object in new and nontraditional ways.

• In the candle/tack-box problem, functional fixedness may lead us to see the box as only a box, not a potential candleholder.

Misinformation Effects: How Information That Comes Later Can Distort Memory

• Misinformation effect– errors in memory that occur when new information influences existing memories

• Misinformation may not only distort our memories of events that actually occurred, but lead us to falsely remember events that never happened.

• Claims of ‘recovered’ memories of traumatic events (e.g., sexual abuse) may reflect the implantation of false memories by therapists.

Misinformation Effects: How Information That Comes Later Can Distort Memory

• Loftus and Palmer’s (1974) participants viewed a film of a traffic accident and then answered a question about the accident.

• The verb in the question was “hit,” “smashed,” or “contacted.”. The wording of the question influenced the participants’ memory of the accident.

Overconfidence

• Overconfidence– the tendency for people to be too certain about their ability to remember events

and make judgments• Eyewitnesses to crimes are often overconfident.

– There is a very small correlation between an eyewitness’ confidence and the accuracy of the eyewitness’ memory.

• Flashbulb memory– a vivid and emotional memory of an event that people believe they remember

very well• an example might be one’s memory of the 9/11 attacks

– Flashbulb memories are less accurate than we believe them to be.

Heuristic Processing: Availability and Representativeness

• Availability heuristic– The tendency to make judgments

concerning an event’s frequency or likelihood on the basis of the ease with which the event can be retrieved from memory

• Representativeness heuristic– We base judgments on

information that seems to match our expectations, and ignore potentially more relevant statistical information.

Availability Representativeness

Salience and Cognitive Accessibility

• Things that are salient attract our attention, and may be better remembered than things that are less salient.– One example is a weapon in a

crime scene.

• Knowledge that is activated in memory is accessible and is more likely to drive cognition and behavior than is less accessible knowledge.

Salience Cognitive Accessibility

Counterfactual Thinking

• Counterfactual thinking– The tendency to think about and experience events according to “what might

have been”• Silver medalists in the 1992 Summer Olympics were less happy than were

the bronze medalists because the silver medalists could imagine easily ‘what might have been’ – winning the gold (Gilovich, 1995).

Accuracy and Inaccuracy in Memory and Cognition

• Key Takeaways– Our memories fail in part due to inadequate encoding and storage, and in part

due to the inability to accurately retrieve stored information.– The human brain is wired to develop and make use of social categories and

schemas. Schemas help us remember new information but may also lead us to falsely remember things that never happened to us and to distort or misremember things that did.

– A variety of cognitive biases influence the accuracy of our judgments.