Invitation to Psychology

ChaPteR 8 Memory 299

have more ambivalent and insecure attachments

remember such quarrels as being worse than they

were (Feeney & Cassidy, 2003).

A story’s theme may also influence our judg-

ments of events and people in the present. If you

have a fight with your lover, the central theme in

your story about the fight might be negative (“He

was a jerk”) or neutral (“It was a mutual misunder-

standing”). This theme may bias you to blame or

forgive your partner long after you have forgotten

what the conflict was all about or who said what

(McGregor & Holmes, 1999). You can see that the

spin you give a story is critical, so be careful about

the stories you tell!

personal humility, tend to report early memories
of family or neighborhood activities, conflicts with
friends or relatives that were resolved, and emo-
tionally neutral events (Wang, 2008).
Once you have formulated a story’s central
theme (“My father never liked us”; “My part-
ner was always so competitive with me”), that
theme may then serve as a cognitive schema that
guides what you remember and what you for-
get (Mather, Shafir, & Johnson, 2000). Teenagers
who have strong and secure attachments to their
mothers remember previous quarrels with their
moms as being less intense and conflicted than
they reported at the time, whereas teenagers who

Recite & Review

Recite: It’s time to say out loud everything you can about childhood amnesia and the role of

narratives in autobiographical memory.

Review: Next, go back and read this section again.

Now take this Quick Quiz:

1. A friend of yours claims to remember her birth, her first tooth, and her first birthday party. She
   is most likely to be (a) confabulating, (b) repressing, (c) revealing wishful thinking, (d) accurately
   remembering.


2. Give three explanations for childhood amnesia (be specific).


3. Why are the themes in our life stories so important?
   Answers:

Study and Review at MyPsychLab

the immaturity of certain brain structures, making it difficult for very young children to focus attention, encode, and 2. a, c1.

remember; cognitive factors such as immature cognitive schemas, lack of linguistic skills, and lack of a self-concept; lack of

They guide what we remember and forget about our 3. knowledge of social conventions for encoding and reporting events

personal pasts, and affect our judgments of events and people.

Psychology in the news revisited

Psychological research is having a significant impact
on people’s ability to think critically about memory.
Most notably, awareness of the fallibility of mem-
ory is growing among police, interrogators, defense
attorneys, prosecutors, and judges (Loftus, 2013).
Unfortunately, as we saw, the case of Ronald Cotton,
described at the start of this chapter, is far from
unique. According to the Innocence Project at the
Cardozo School of Law, eyewitness mistakes cause
more than three-fourths of all wrongful convictions. Of
course, not all eyewitness testimony is erroneous. But
the potential for errors in identification shows how
important it is to gather evidence carefully, ensure
adequate legal representation for defendants, conduct
police interviews using proper procedures, reduce
pressure on witnesses, and obtain a DNA analysis
whenever possible.

Inspired by the Innocence Project, grassroots orga-

nizations of lawyers and students have been success-

fully challenging questionable convictions. Since the

early 1990s, these efforts have led to the exoneration

of more than 300 innocent people in the United

States, some of whom had been condemned to death.

One man in Illinois, who had been on death row for

16 years, was just hours from execution when a group

of Northwestern University journalism students pro-

duced evidence that another man had committed the

crime. Other investigative projects around the world

have produced similar accomplishments.

How would you feel if your testimony resulted in

the conviction of an innocent person? Would you, like

Jennifer Thompson, be able to admit your mistake, or

would you, as most people do, cling more stubbornly

than ever to the accuracy of your memory? Thompson

268

MEMORY

8

Wrongly Convicted Man and His AccuserTell Their Story

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