False Memory Syndrome

False Memory Syndrome False memory is a very destructive condition, one that can change the emotional state of someone possibly making them go mad. It can be live changing coming to the reality that a great deal of your life as you know it has been created. False memory syndrome affects many lives to this day. Having a false memory is not uncommon at all. Most times false memories are created on accident by you or an other individual. A false memory is a condition in which a person’s identity and relationships are affected by memories that are factually incorrect but are strongly believed.
Peter J. Freyd was a psychologist who coined the term. Although he created the name he did not have a strong impact on the game. Ralf Underwager and Elizabeth Loftus had a major influence on the study of false memory. Loftus is most known for her Lost in the mall experiment. She selected a group of individuals randomly and questioned them about their past getting to know them. Then asked them regularly about four events that had taken place in their childhood. Only three of the events were true, the fourth was created. The fourth was a scene where they were lost in the mall for a relatively long period of time then they were rescued by an elderly person and safely returned to their parents. After making the created memory seem very believable and asked about the mishap over the course of a few days the participants began to believe that they were actually lost in the mall as a child, they even gave contributing details to that day.
False memories can be formed through: misinformation, misattribution, emotions, fuzzy traces, and inference. Misinformation is when you see a person or something once, for a brief moment and when asked about it, the question contains details about the subject in question. Misattribution is when you mix up details from two separate events. When you imagine this memory happening you strengthen it more. False memories can be formed through the type