The Science of False Memory

Oxford Psychology

by Charles J. Brainerd

Findings from research on false memory have major implications for a number of fields central to human welfare, such as medicine and law. Although many important conclusions have been reached after a decade or so of intensive research, the majority of them are not well known outside the immediate field. To make this research accessible to a much wider audience, The Science of False Memory has been written to require little or no background knowledge of the theory and techniques used in memory research.

Brainerd and Reyna introduce the volume by considering the progenitors to the modern science of false memory, and noting the remarkable degree to which core themes of contemporary research were anticipated by historical figure such as Binet, Piaget, and Bartlett. They continue with an account of the varied methods that have been used to study false memory both inside and outside of the laboratory. The first part of the volume focuses on the basic science of false memory, revolving around three topics: old and new theoretical ideas that have been used to explain false memory and make predictions about it; research findings and predictions about false memory in normal adults; and research findings and predictions about age-related changes in false memory between early childhood and adulthood. Throughout Part I, Brainerd and Reyna emphasize how current opponent-processes conceptions of false memory act as a unifying influence by integrating predictions and data across disparate forms of
false memory.
The second part focuses on the applied science of false memory, revolving around four topics: the falsifiability of witnesses and suspects memories of crimes, including false confessions by suspects; the falsifiability of eyewitness identifications of suspects; false-memory reports in investigative interviews of child victims and witnesses, particularly in connection with sexual-abuse crimes; false memory in psychotherapy, including recovered memories of childhood abuse, multiple-personality disorders, and recovered memories of previous lives. Although Part II is concerned with applied research, Brainerd and Reyna continue to emphasize the unifying influence of opponent-processes conceptions of false memory. The third part focuses on emerging trends, revolving around three expanding areas of false-memory research: mathematical models, aging effects, and cognitive neuroscience. False Memory will be an invaluable resource for professional researchers, practitioners, and students in the
many fields for which false-memory research has implications, including child-protective services, clinical psychology, law, criminal justice, elementary and secondary education, general medicine, journalism, and psychiatry.

Genres: Psychology, Science

578 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2005

Reviews

[Jurij Fedorov · Rating 2 out of 5]

It's an outdated and badly written style. It's a regular book format where as real memory research contains a ton of illustrations, photos, videos, shapes, real events. So instead of being a proper scientific introduction many chapters go on and on about regular events or hazy stories because that's what a no image format allows for.

When they go into studies they also have to describe all images and photos used and the writing is so academic and clunky it's hard to visualize anything they describe. A simple experiment with word-pairings becomes a confused academic mess I can't understand even though I have read hundreds of academic papers. With false memory research basically all experiments show you videos, photos, or stories. So without this it's not really illustrating the real research. Even older studies included photos which is not overly common in psychology. It just shows how crucial it was to illustrate the study. The studies without photos often were hard to understand or replicate. Without all details being exact you can't retest the true claim and hence can't know if the study was legit.