Cognitive and behavioral approaches to memory distortions: an overview

Abstract

The occurrence of false memory phenomena is of practical concern in situations where inaccurate recall has severe repercussions, leading to applied research on topics such as eyewitness testimony (e.g., Loftus & Palmer, 1974) and childhood sexual abuse (e.g., Ceci & Friedman, 2000; Goodman & Clarke-Stewart, 1991). When studied on a basic level, cognitive psychology typically uses the term “memory” as a noun, referring to a cognitive mental entity that is an informational representation of an event (e.g. Gallo, 2006). A “true memory” accurately preserves information about events as they happened, whereas a “false memory” is a distorted representation or otherwise does not correspond with events as they occurred. False memories are purportedly the result of information processing errors, and extrapolation from such errors is thought to reveal the nature of the cognitive structures and mechanisms deemed responsible for remembering (Brainerd & Reyna, 2005). As such, false memories are of special interest to basic cognitive researchers seeking to develop effectively predictive mechanistic models (e.g., schema theory: Brewer & Treyens, 1981).