The Mandela effect is a popular conspiracy theory that has spread throughout the internet. Due to people’s false memories of certain events, they have created crazy ideas to explain why history itself has changed. A few examples of this are people’s belief that Jif peanut is actually called Jiffy. The main example is people’s belief that Nelson Mandela died in the 80s when his actual death happened in 2013. Many people were surprised to hear he wasn’t already dead. The truth is that “The Mandela Effect” is both caused by faulty memory and our lack of understanding of memory. People believe that memory is a record of history when in reality our brains take in bites of information to form memories. Those bites of information don’t stay the same over the years. Information we gain after the event can change past memories. Another reason for the Mandela effect occurring is that our brains naturally fill in the gaps in our memories. This is the main reason eye-witnesses arent taken to seriously. Often during events with multiple witnesses, there are conflicting details between witnesses. People spreading these false ideas of events can also prime people to believe that false idea. This is called priming. Suggesting an idea to someone can alter an existing memory in someone’s head. This idea affects one’s ability to recall the event. People put too much value on the brain’s ability to recall events, so they take the thing they recall as fact. Even some of the examples of the effect related to me. As a child, one of the children’s books I loved to read was the Bernstain Bear’s. I always thought the books were spelled the Bernstein Bears. I specifically remember it is spelled this way cause I always thought it was spelled like my last name, “Stein”. When I found out about this, I almost started to question if maybe the crazy conspiracy theorists were correct, but it turns out my idea of memory was flawed.
https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-the-mandela-effect-4589394
Cuncic, Arlin. “The Mandela Effect and Examples.” Verywell Mind, Verywell Mind, 17 July 2019, www.verywellmind.com/what-is-the-mandela-effect-4589394.
When we discussed false memories in lecture I do not recall talking about the Mandela Effect but this is a great example of us relying on our brain’s ability to recall events and in this case, a book. I recently saw a Mandela effect example where the Monopoly man from the famous gameboard actually does not have a monocle, but I could have sworn he did! Maybe I had a false memory of this because whenever I think of a rich, posh person, I think of them wearing fancy attire, such as a monocle.