• Question: Why does our brain remember things differently than what actually happened?

    Asked by elliesmith to Tim, Damien, Suzi on 23 Jun 2011. This question was also asked by harrikj.
    • Photo: Suzi Gage

      Suzi Gage answered on 23 Jun 2011:

      Hi @elliesmith and @harrikj

      This is a great question.
      Our brain can often be influenced by other things when we try and remember certain things. Often it’s at the ‘recall’ stage of memory. An experiment found that when people saw the same video of a car crash, they were more likely to say that the cars were speeding if the person asking them said ‘did you see them smash together’ rather than ‘did you see them bump together’. Also they were more likely to say they remembered breaking glass, even if there wasn’t any.

      This is why the police have to be really careful when interviewing witnesses, as they can accidentally lead them to misremember.

      I’m afraid I’m not really sure why this is, but we are very susceptible to language influencing our memory.

      I hope this helps a bit, maybe Tim can fill in the blanks I’ve left!

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