We believe our memories. They assist us in identifying loved ones, remembering childhood, and creating the stories we tell about ourselves. From birthdays to family vacations to life-changing milestones, memories are the very fabric of our identity. What if some of those memories were never true to start with? Modern psychology and neuroscience have discovered a surprising fact: memory is not an accurate recording of the past. Rather, it's a dynamic, reconstructive process that can sometimes produce vivid memories of events that never actually occurred.
False memory – Memory of an event that is distorted, exaggerated or completely false. False memories often feel as real as true memories. False memories are not lying. We think they are real. They are not signs of mental illness or low intelligence, but rather a normal aspect of how the human brain encodes and retrieves information.
How False Memories Form
False memories can be formed in many different ways. Sometimes a suggestion from another person is a seed planted. Sometimes the idea gets familiar through repetition, so familiar that the brain thinks it's something we actually saw or did.
“The brain does not label memories as "true" or "false"; instead, it draws on a feeling of familiarity and confidence.”
One of the most famous studies was done by psychologist Elizabeth Loftus, who showed that even asking people leading questions about a "lost" childhood event was enough to make them confidently remember something that never happened, like getting lost in a mall as a child.
In recent years neuroscience has demonstrated that when we remember something our brain reconstructs the memory rather than simply retrieving it as a file in a computer. Every time we remember an event, we rewrite it. We add details, fill in holes, and sometimes distort the truth without realizing it.
The Brain's Confidence Trick
False memories are powerful because they often feel like they are true. The brain does not label memories as "true" or "false"; instead, it draws on a feeling of familiarity and confidence.
If we are told something happened to us, or if we imagine it with enough detail, our brains may store it as if it were a true memory, with the same emotional heft. False memories activate many of the same areas as real remembering, including those involved with emotion and sensory detail, according to brain scans.
"The mind can't always tell the difference—and neither can we."
