24 PEOPLE RECONSTRUCT MEMORIES EACH TIME THEY REMEMBER THEM

PEOPLE RECONSTRUCT MEMORIES EACH TIME THEY REMEMBER THEMMEMORIES CHANGE When you think about this event, it probably plays in your mind like a short movie clip. Because you experience memories this way, you tend to think that memories are stored in their entirety and never change, like an archived movie. But that’s not what happens.

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 Memories are actually reconstructed every time we think of them. They’re not movie clips that are stored in the brain in a certain location, like files on a hard drive  They are nerve pathways that fire anew each time we remember the event. This makes for some interesting effects. For example, the memory can change each time it is retrieved.

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If you’re testing or interviewing customers about a product, the words you use can affect greatly what people “remember.”Don’t rely on self-reports of past behavior. People will not remember accurately what they or others did or said.