Remember That Time…

Has anyone ever asked you if you remember that time that we/you did… and you have a vague recollection of the memory, but the more they talk about it the more you remember? That might be because the event actually happened or you may have just had a false memory planted in your mind. I came across this problem while I was researching why we do not have memories from our infant years. As I read this article on infant memories, I happened upon the work of Elizabeth Loftus. Elizabeth loftus is famous for her work on memory planting, which is the act of inserting a memory into someone’s childhood and convincing them that it is true. I became intrigued and I wondered how this was possible. Loftus even went as far as to suggest that none of our memories may be real. After walking around in a state of confusion and doubt for the rest of the day I decided to learn exactly how one can do this and found that it is pretty simple.  

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A big disclaimer, I am not advocating for people to go around doing this because people have gotten in serious trouble. For example, the reason that this phenomenon came to be in the public eye was a bout of famous cases in the mid 90s. These incidents involved numerous women who became convinced that they were involved in satanic cults or were victims of sexual abuse at the hands of their families. All of the women in these cases fell victim to memory planting during what was supposed to be therapy.

Elizabeth Lotus began studying “memory distortion” in the 1970s. By september of 1997 Loftus had conducted 200 studies with a total of 20,000 subjects. Loftus’ study that intrigued me the most was one in which she was able to convince people that at the age of 5 they had gotten lost in a shopping mall. To conduct this experiment she used 24 subjects varying in age between 18-53. She then gave each subject a book with 4 paragraphs; each a different childhood story supplied by the parents except 1 which was the story about being lost in the shopping mall. After reading these the subjects were asked to record how well they remembered each memory. The subjects were then asked to return for two follow up interviews in which they were asked to recall their memories. By the time of the second interview 6 of the 24 subjects claimed to have remembered the fictitious event. These results have been repeated numerous times which can be read about here conducted by many other scientists. Although it was clear that memories could be planted in a person’s mind through the power of persuasion there was no known mechanism, that is until 2013.

In 2013 MIT was able to make the first steps towards discovering exactly what happens when a memory is planted. They did this in a study of mice, in which they manipulated the brain cells in the hippocampus of the mice. The method of doing this was through creating a powerful memory by shocking the mice every time a certain light went off. By instilling this correlation between the light and the shock they were able to create a link in the brain cells that associated the light with pain. Although this is not exactly the same as memory planting MIT was able to create a fearful memory with artificial means. While this may not seem related it is our first step towards explaining why our memories are so malleable.

Although I did not find a concrete scientific explanation as to how memory planting works I will be certain to be skeptical of events that people try to remind me of that I cannot remember.

 

Citations

 

Photo

 

Creating a False Memory in the Hippocampus, Steve Ramirez, Xu Liu, Pei-Ann Lin, Junghyup Suh, Michele Pignatelli, Roger L. Redondo, Tomás J.Ryan and Susumu Tonegawa (July 25, 2013)

 

Gorvett 26 July 2016, Zaria. “The Mystery of Why You Can’t Remember Being a Baby.” BBC. BBC Online, 26 July 2016. Web. 19 Oct. 2016.
Loftus, Elizabeth F. “Creating False Memories.” Creating False Memories. Scientific American, Sept. 1997. Web. 19 Oct. 2016.

One thought on “Remember That Time…

  1. Matthew J Overmoyer

    This is an interesting topic. The study you found, I found to be a bit different than the concept of memory planting. It involves mice and electrocution, but it does show that false memories can be created. I wonder why more in depth studies haven’t been taken because the implications of this are huge. Especially with the increase in allegations in the media, against rapists and others whose actions I don’t agree with, but it does make you question their validity, especially when it has been a long time since the events transpired. It also makes you wonder how good or memory is to begin with.

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