The influence of social, para-social, and nonsocial misleading post-event sources on memory performance.

Misinformation encountered after witnessing an event is known to influence subsequent memory reports about this event. In most research, misleading information was introduced impersonally, for example, by means of a written description, but it is now well established that delivering it in a social interaction is effective as well. Less is known about the relative effectiveness of impersonal post-event misinformation compared with a socially presented one. The present research provides a direct empirical comparison between social, para-social, and impersonal methods of delivering misinformation. Results indicate that the way in which post-event information is provided does not affect the number of false recall items, source monitoring, or remember-know distinction, with a high Bayesian probability of the obtained no-difference effects. Results show that the social conformity factor does not significantly influence the impact of misleading post-event information. The paper also provides a theoretical comparison of the two effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]