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Many studies have documented that exposure to post event misinformation can lead eyewitnesses to misremember witnessing events they did not see and do so with high confidence. The goal of the present study was to investigate whether reporting of suggested misinformation can be reversed following a correction, and if so, whether misinformation would be more resistant to correction when it serves an explanatory function than when it does not. In two experiments participants witnessed an event, were exposed to a blatantly false suggestion(s) and one week later received a correction followed by a test of their memory for the witnessed event. We found evidence for both the persistence of misinformation following a correction (E1) and the complete reversibility of misinformation effects following a highly salient correction (E2). Although false reporting of the misinformation doubled when it served an explanatory function relative to when it did not (E1 and E2), in both experiments we found no evidence that resistance to correction varied as a function of the misinformation's explanatory role. Our findings suggest that, with a salient correction provided by a credible source, people are capable of updating their knowledge with new information that reverses what they previously thought.

Recent research suggests that linguistic and musical information are processed by shared working memory resources in non-musicians. However, it is still unclear how musical information is actively maintained by those with extensive musical experience. Some evidence suggests that those with musical experience may utilize distinct processing systems for the active maintenance of linguistic and musical information. To explore this possibility, a cross-modal interference paradigm was used in which those with and without musical experience were presented with an initial stimulus (word or chord), followed by intervening stimuli (words, chords, or silence), and then a comparison stimulus (word or chord). The participants' task was to indicate whether the comparison stimulus was the same or different from the initial stimulus. Results revealed a pattern of data that would be expected if the active maintenance of linguistic and musical information was accomplished by distinct systems in those with musical experience and a unitary system in non-musicians.

Abstract. The present study sought to explore whether musical information is processed by the phonological loop component of the working memory model of immediate memory. Original instantiations of this model primarily focused on the processing of linguistic information. However, the model was less clear about how acoustic information lacking phonological qualities is actively processed. Although previous research has generally supported shared processing of phonological and musical information, these studies were limited as a result of a number of methodological concerns (e.g., the use of simple tones as musical stimuli). In order to further investigate this issue, an auditory interference task was employed. Specifically, participants heard an initial stimulus (musical or linguistic) followed by an intervening stimulus (musical, linguistic, or silence) and were then asked to indicate whether a final test stimulus was the same as or different from the initial stimulus. Results indicated that mismatched interference conditions (i.e., musical – linguistic; linguistic – musical) resulted in greater interference than silence conditions, with matched interference conditions producing the greatest interference. Overall, these results suggest that processing of linguistic and musical information draws on at least some of the same cognitive resources.

The present study sought to explore whether musical information is processed by the phonological loop component of the working memory model of immediate memory. Original instantiations of this model primarily focused on the processing of linguistic information. However, the model was less clear about how acoustic information lacking phonological qualities is actively processed. Although previous research has generally supported shared processing of phonological and musical information, these studies were limited as a result of a number of methodological concerns (e.g., the use of simple tones as musical stimuli). In order to further investigate this issue, an auditory interference task was employed. Specifically, participants heard an initial stimulus (musical or linguistic) followed by an intervening stimulus (musical, linguistic, or silence) and were then asked to indicate whether a final test stimulus was the same as or different from the initial stimulus. Results indicated that mismatched interference conditions (i.e., musical - linguistic; linguistic - musical) resulted in greater interference than silence conditions, with matched interference conditions producing the greatest interference. Overall, these results suggest that processing of linguistic and musical information draws on at least some of the same cognitive resources.

Several recent commentaries have suggested possible researcher bias on the part of scientists conducting studies that find evidence of a causal link between violent video game play and aggression. The present article argues that patterns of authorship, publication, and research findings within the experimental violent video game-aggression literature are inconsistent with the researcher bias hypothesis. It is concluded that the claim of a causal link between violent video game play and aggression is a defensible interpretation of the current experimental and meta-analytic literatures.

In a recent paper, Chrobak and Zaragoza (Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 142(3), 827-844, 2013) proposed the explanatory role hypothesis, which posits that the likelihood of developing false memories for post-event suggestions is a function of the explanatory function the suggestion serves. In support of this hypothesis, they provided evidence that participant-witnesses were especially likely to develop false memories for their forced fabrications when their fabrications helped to explain outcomes they had witnessed. In three experiments, we test the generality of the explanatory role hypothesis as a mechanism of eyewitness suggestibility by assessing whether this hypothesis can predict suggestibility errors in (a) situations where the post-event suggestions are provided by the experimenter (as opposed to fabricated by the participant), and (b) across a variety of memory measures and measures of recollective experience. In support of the explanatory role hypothesis, participants were more likely to subsequently freely report (E1) and recollect the suggestions as part of the witnessed event (E2, source test) when the post-event suggestion helped to provide a causal explanation for a witnessed outcome than when it did not serve this explanatory role. Participants were also less likely to recollect the suggestions as part of the witnessed event (on measures of subjective experience) when their explanatory strength had been reduced by the presence of an alternative explanation that could explain the same outcome (E3, source test + warning). Collectively, the results provide strong evidence that the search for explanatory coherence influences people's tendency to misremember witnessing events that were only suggested to them.

Objectives: Confabulations occur in schizophrenia and certain severe neuropsychiatric conditions, and to a lesser degree in healthy individuals. The present study used a forced confabulation paradigm to assess differences in confabulation between schizophrenia patients and healthy controls. Methods: Schizophrenia patients (n=60) and healthy control participants (n=19) were shown a video with missing segments, asked to fill in the gaps with speculations, and tested on their memory for the story. Cognitive functions and severity of symptoms were also evaluated. Results: Schizophrenia patients generated significantly more confabulations than healthy control participants and had a greater tendency to generate confabulations that were related to each other. Schizophrenic confabulations were positively associated with temporal context confusions and formal thought disorder, and negatively with delusions. Conclusions: Our findings show that the schizophrenia patients generate more confabulations than healthy controls and schizophrenic confabulations are associated with positive symptoms. (JINS, 2016, 22, 911–919)

Recent research has demonstrated that people are especially susceptible to false memory development for suggested misinformation that fills a causal role (i.e., explains some known outcome) (Chrobak & Zaragoza, 2013). However, little is known about how factors associated with the witnessed outcome impact the likelihood of false memory development. In the present study, outcome valence (negative, positive, or neutral) was manipulated. Participants heard several short stories that contained an outcome (e.g., a counselor getting promoted) that lacked a causal explanation. Participants were subsequently exposed to suggested causal misinformation that explained that outcome (e.g., the counselor performed an impressive act the previous day) and then were tested on their memory for the original event. Results indicated that participants incorrectly reported the suggested causal information more when it explained either a positive or negative outcome as opposed to a neutral outcome. Theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed.

Studies of text comprehension have amply demonstrated that when reading a story, people seek to identify the causal and motivational forces that drive the interactions of characters and link events (e.g., Zwaan, Langston, & Graesser, 1995), thereby achieving explanatory coherence. In the present study we provide the first evidence that the search for explanatory coherence also plays a role in the memory errors that result from suggestive forensic interviews. Using a forced fabrication paradigm (e.g., Chrobak & Zaragoza, 2008), we conducted 3 experiments to test the hypothesis that false memory development is a function of the explanatory role these forced fabrications served (the explanatory role hypothesis). In support of this hypothesis, participants were more likely to subsequently freely report (Experiment 1) and falsely assent to (Experiment 2) their forced fabrications when they helped to provide a causal explanation for a witnessed outcome than when they did not serve this explanatory role. Participants were also less likely to report their forced fabrications when their explanatory strength had been reduced by the presence of an alternative explanation that could explain the same outcome as their fabrication (Experiment 3). These findings extend prior research on narrative and event comprehension processes by showing that the search for explanatory coherence can continue for weeks after the witnessed event is initially perceived, such that causally relevant misinformation from subsequent interviews is, over time, incorporated into memory for the earlier witnessed event.