Reconstructive memory

• Credibility - Idea of schemas supported by studies

  • Loftus study - showed clips of car crashes and gave a questionnaire, only one critical question with an intense verb about speed but others less intense verbs
  • Also tested if there was any broken glass in the film which was falsely recalled
  • Concluded eye witnesses are unreliable as influenced by leading questions - change memories by incorporating new information
  • Use standardised procedures - objective and reliable
• Objections - Bartlett study not scientific

  • Lacked some scientific elements as it didn't have strict control over variables as didn't have scientific procedures when getting to reproduce the story
  • Sample size was small so not representative of entire population affecting reliability of findings
  • Getting students to reproduce Native American ghost stories lacks ecological validity - doesn't represent how memory works in everyday life situations
  • However claimed had to be weird to level and sharpen details
• Differences - Links to Tulving about semantic memory

  • Tulving - memory has semantic stores where we keep our understanding of relationship and rules which is similar to schemas
  • Schemas meaningful patterns of information which differ from person to person - they are separate semantic stores
  • If Tulving ideas true makes reconstructive memory plausible
  • If reconstructive memory true then semantic memory has more influence over episodic memory as schemas influence how we construct our memories