How Easy Is It to Falsify Memory? How Social Pressure Affects What We Remember

This concept is highly suspect and ripe for abuse as a counter intelligence tactic. But perhaps I’m just a conspiracy theorist and prone to delusions like Hemingway.

Does this really show that they’re creating false memories? Because from the summary at least it sounds more like confirmation that people doubt the validity of their own memories when confronted with contradicting evidence. Which seems like it would be a good thing. Especially when the subject is something like details of a film. Films are social by nature; it’s frequently more important to have a shared experience than to actually know what the film was about. Let’s see them ‘falsify memories’ of more important facts, then maybe it’ll be news.

“I will remember to remember to forget you forgot me”

I’ve watched social pressure alter group memories before. Its more than a little creepy. I’m cursed with a fairly good memory that tests just short of eidetic/photographic. I am also famously stubborn…which has led to some arguments among old friends who remember things that we experienced together quite differently than I do. This includes a fight I barely managed to stay upright through…but which they recall as a win on my part. I should accept their generous version of events…but I know that decades have softened their memory of it in my favor. If I hadn’t bounced off the wall behind me after an uppercut to the jaw…I’d have been on the floor and I know it…and no amount of wishing it were more glorious can make me recall anything differently. And this is true of every less than wondrous moment of my life. I’d love to rewrite my memory and excise the worst parts. I envy people that can do this almost instinctively (although the political ramifications are horrifying.)

The next two paragraphs address this: “But were they simply conforming to perceived social demands, or had
their memory of the film actually undergone a change? To find out, the
researchers invited the subjects back to the lab to take the memory test
once again, telling them that the answers they had previously been fed
were not those of their fellow film watchers, but random computer
generations. Some of the responses reverted back to the original,
correct ones, but close to half remained erroneous, implying that the
subjects were relying on false memories implanted in the earlier
session.

An analysis of the fMRI data showed differences in brain activity
between the persistent false memories and the temporary errors of social
compliance. The most outstanding feature of the false memories was a
strong co-activation and connectivity between two brain areas: the
hippocampus and the amygdala. The hippocampus is known to play a role in
long-term memory formation, while the amygdala, sometimes known as the
emotion center of the brain, plays a role in social interaction. The
scientists think that the amygdala may act as a gateway connecting the
social and memory processing parts of our brain; its “stamp” may be
needed for some types of memories, giving them approval to be uploaded
to the memory banks. Thus social reinforcement could act on the amygdala
to persuade our brains to replace a strong memory with a false one.”