False memory describes a psychological occurrence whereby an individual remembers something that did not take place. Having a fake memory is a common phenomenon that is characterized by a person forgetting what they have seen and one starts suggesting alternatives, for instance, the color of the pants a friend was wearing. Ramirez et al., (2013) asserts that the memory can sometimes be unreliable since it can be manipulated regarding storage of knowledge. In this study, the primary objective of the experiment is to assess if people choose to remember information that was not presented. The research shall aim to study two hypotheses in a bit to achieve the objective of the study. These are;
a) People sometimes remember information on a phenomenon that did not happen
b) A similarity in of the memory context facilitates false memory.
Participants
The study used a sample of 10 respondents in performing the experiment and drawing inferences. The respondents comprised of 5 male and 5 female adults drawn from my peers at school. Recruitment began with walking around in different areas of the campus at Central Connecticut State University. Randomly selecting male & female participants and first telling them that I had an experiment which shall involve recalling words after they listened to a pre-recorded list and would have to write down as many words as they could remember. I had a good amount of individuals that all voluntarily accepted to participate. Ages for the female were 19, 18, 20, 18 and 21 represented as V, W, X, Y, and Z while the males; 18, 21, 19, 19 and 20 designated as A, B, C, D and E respectively all with a mean age of 19.3 years. “list A” and the other five “list B” folded and then I mixed them allowing them to select without them knowing which recorded words they would get to hear. The table below represents the outcomes.
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| List | Males | Females |
| List A | D, A, and C | X and Z |
| List B | B and E | V, W, and Y |
| Total | 5 | 5 |
Materials
The two lists comprised of different sets of items are listed in the table below.
| List | Items on list |
| List A (target present) | dog, grass, house, pencil, cup, tree, sleep, computer, book, trash, laugh, hair, sneeze, paper, rainbow |
| List B (target absent) | bed, rest, awake, tired, dream, wake, snooze, blanket, doze, slumber, snore, nap, peace, yawn, drowsy |
The participants were given a pen and a sheet of paper to write their responses
Procedure
The study involved reading the list items to the individual in from their respective list groups in a quiet corner of the classroom. In a consistent interval of one second each I read out the list items starting with members of list A followed by list B. I played the tape recorder and every participant was required to listen to the tape until the end before being allowed to start to writing what they recalled. Upon completion, details of the participants were written on the opposite side of the paper that I had provided, so I could keep a count of my hard copy work. The experiment was completed with a verbal appreciation to each participants for the acceptance to participate in the study.
Results and Discussion
The findings were quite interesting such that the number of participants in list A who recalled the word ‘sleep’ was 3 while those in list B who recalled it was 2. The bar graph below gives a detailed illustration of the findings.
From the bar graph above, it is evident that the two participants in list B recalled the word sleep even though it did not feature in list B. These findings were to some extent, consistent with my expectations that sometimes one’s brain can recall a phenomenon that did not take place. Furthermore, is expected that those majority of those who will recall the word “sleep” would be in list A; some that coincide with the study findings. It is imperative to note that the items that were most recalled by participants were 'dog' in while the least was 'rainbow' in list A. on the other hand, rest was the most recalled work while peace was the least in list B.
The findings specifically on the study hypotheses that the context facilitate the occurrence of false memory coincides with Goldstein, (2014) assertion that participants on list B associated sleep with other words that were on the list. Goldstein further asserts that errors in human memory are caused by the cognitive process that takes place in the brain as a result of the creative nature of mental processes. The creative nature of the human brain is advantageous as it enables filling of gaps in a case of incomplete information.
According to Lacy and Stark, (2013), the discovery that human brain can exhibit false memories has brought about a paradox in the use of eyewitnesses in court proceedings. The human mind is considered to be a reconstructive process vulnerable to distortions. In such a case, any distortions like those in the findings of this study can bring about misled judgments on the part of the court when the prosecution is expecting the witness to have a real memory of the crime. The reconstructive mental process among participants in list B led them to recall the word sleep even if it was not among the items on the list. Such a scenario illustrates the creative nature of the mind as the participants forgot the items listed, their brain filled the gap with information that is, the item ‘sleep’. Even though false memory is a common occurrence among people, it is likely to influence courts decisions regarding the use of eyewitness and a key to court judgment proceedings.
References
Goldstein, E. B. (2014). Cognitive psychology: Connecting mind, research, and everyday experience . Nelson Education.
Lacy, J. W., & Stark, C. E. L. (2013). The Neuroscience of Memory: Implications for the Courtroom. Nature Reviews. Neuroscience , 14 (9), 649–658. http://doi.org/10.1038/nrn3563
Ramirez, S., Liu, X., Lin, P. A., Suh, J., Pignatelli, M., Redondo, R. L., ... & Tonegawa, S. (2013). Creating a false memory in the hippocampus. Science , 341 (6144), 387-391.
