Increasing false recognition rates with confirmatory feedback: a phenomenological analysis

Am J Psychol. 2003 Winter;116(4):515-25.

Abstract

During a simulated witness interrogation, participants were encouraged to confabulate an account consistent with false information concerning a videotaped event. The interviewer verbally affirmed some false responses. Previous research has shown that, a week later, participants often recognize confabulated events that were affirmed by the experimenter as being from the video. What is unclear is whether confirmatory feedback encouraged a change in the mental representation of the confabulated events to fit the original event or confirmation might have merely encouraged a change in beliefs about the event. To further understand the mechanisms that underlie the confirmatory feedback effect, participants were asked to judge the phenomenological experience associated with false recognition.

MeSH terms

  • Adult
  • Crime
  • Feedback, Psychological*
  • Female
  • Humans
  • Male
  • Recognition, Psychology*
  • Repression, Psychology*
  • Time Factors
  • Video Recording