Examine how one theory of emotion may affect one cognitive process

I am Brooklyn Bowie, a Health and Safety student at Sheridan High School. After learning about drinking and driving, I want to propose that the BAC be lowered from 0.08 to 0.06 for the safety of everyone on and off the road because even people with a BAC of 0.02 can have affected driving ability which can increase the likelihood of drivers being involved in fatal crashes and it is proven that with a BAC between 0.06 and 0.06, you are three times more likely to be involved in a crash.

In the article You Have No Idea What Happened by Maria Konnikorva there is a quote near the end of the reading that really sums up human memory. Lila Davachi, a N.Y.U. neuroscientist who performed an experiment on emotional memories said that “the goal of memory isn’t to keep the details. It’s to be able to generalize from what you know so that you are more confident in acting on it.” This experiment was to test people’s memory after getting an electric shock to images. The results showed that people’s memory of the images tied with the shocks were enhanced as well as similar images from a test before without any shocks. Davachi was not just referring exclusively of the people that participated in the experiment, but to humankind as a whole.

The mode of implantation from the researchers included telling the participants multiple accurate childhood memories and would include one false memory (Loftus, 1997). The researchers validated the memories told to the participants by informing each participant that their parent(s) had been spoken to and those memories had been offered up (Loftus, 1997). Some of the false memories included being lost in a shopping mall when younger or spilling a drink onto the dress of a bride at a wedding (Loftus, 1997). 37% of those with the implanted memories found themselves able to recall the false memory provided in great detail and were often found to contain much emotion on the part of the participant (Loftus,

Throughout our lives, we definitely have gone through a lot of experiences and made memories. Some of the memories are easily forgotten, while some others are remembered distinctively, vividly and can be recollected confidently. This is called the flashbulb memory. Flashbulb memory is like a very clear picture of a particularly impactful event which had caused one to be affected emotionally. For example, I remember this performance that my school choir was performing. It was during Christmas season and we decided to spray bubble foam to portray fake snow. However, the plan backfired when the wind blew at our direction and all the foam flew back to us. This was remembered very clearly because I was embarrassed and had experienced something so

The students read the booklets, and were told to write "I don't remember this" if they didn't remember an event occurring in their childhood. She found that twenty-five percent of subjects remembered the false account of being lost in a mall. Those subjects even described their accounts in bright, vivid detail, despite the fact that it had never even

She was loving, alluring and most important she was drop dead gorgeous. She was even considered the most beautiful goddess in Olympia, her name is Aphrodite. Aphrodite represents various values but her most known are beauty, love, sexuality and fertility.

Throughout the history of the United States’ judicial system, eyewitness testimonies — an account from a witness of a crime or an accident that involves the witness recounting their firsthand experience of the incident to a court — have been used as conclusive evidence to prove a defendant guilty. It is thought that although memory can be unclear at times, it is assumed memories of stressful or otherwise threatening events are well encoded into the brain, largely indelible, and therefore can be accurately recalled. This idea is based off of the psychological concept of flashbulb memories which are “sudden onsets of emotionally significant events or memories” (“Psychology Students”). However, recent psychological and neuroscientific research

The study of creation of false memories has been a topic of interest since the 1930s when Bartlett (1932) conducted the first experiment on the topic. Though the results of this experiment were never replicated, they contributed greatly to research by distinguishing between reproductive and reconstructive memory (Bartlett 1932 as cited in Roediger & McDermott, 1995). Reproductive memory refers to accurate production of material from memory and is assumed to be associated with remembering simplified materials (e.g., lists). Reconstructive memory emphasizes the active process of filling in missing elements while remembering and is associated with materials rich in meaning (e.g., stories).

As mentioned earlier, for example, the images of the second plane flying into the building will surely stay with me; however, smaller details of the incident, which have become generalized over the years, are not nearly as clear or in order like they were on the day they happened. This is not at all surprising, since according to Perina (2002), flashbulb memories “do, in fact, degrade over a short period of time” (para. 1). The extent to which these events fade or change in our thoughts can vary in degree, and is generally believed to be directly proportionate to a person’s level of involvement in the events that occurred.

A flashbulb memory is a detailed snapshot of an event which evoked feelings of shock or surprise or were otherwise emotionally arousing (Brown and Kulik, 1977). Events which have negative emotions attached to them seem to be processed in a detail-attentive and conservative manner (Bless et al., 1996; Storbeck & Clore, 2005; Bohn and Bernsten, 2007). The age of a witness also seems to influence the formation of flashbulb memories. In a study by Cohen, Conway and Maylor (1993) most of the younger participants experienced flashbulb memory compared to less than half the older participants. They concluded that the main factor which influenced the formation of flashbulb memories for older participants was rehearsal of the events whereas in younger

Memory is a cognitive function of the brain that is often taken for granted. Memory may have many purposes, but most importantly it is essentially a record of an entire life span. From this perspective memory is the most important aspect of consciousness. Unfortunately, through formal experimentation it has been shown that memory is fairly inaccurate, inconsistent, and often influenced by our own experiences as well as the bias of others. Memory is not only affected during an observed event, but there are instances where memory can be influenced after an event as well. There are also instances where memory can be affected retroactively due to personal experiences and biases. Incorrectly recalling the memories of one’s life is usually not

Affect influences many areas of cognition and has a large impact on memory (Robinson, Watkins, & Harmon-Jones, 2013; Packard, Cahill, & McGaugh, 1994). It has been shown that extreme emotional stress can impair memory, while moderate levels of emotional stress can improve learning and memory (Packard et al., 1994). In humans, emotional content is remembered better than non-emotional content and is richer in details (Choi, Kensinger, & Rajaram, 2013). However, it is not totally clear how emotion influences false memories. Past research has examined the effect of emotion on false memories and has reported mixed findings where emotional intensity has increased and decreased false memory (Choi et al., 2013). Storbeck and Clore (2005) found definite results showing that negative emotional affect reduces false memories in adults. The goal of this research is to investigate how positive and negative affective states influence false memory in children and the effect of emotional regulation strategies on memory formation.

Memory does not work like a video camera, smoothly recording every detail. Instead, memory is more of a constructive process. We remember the details that we find most important and relevant. Due to the reconstructive nature of memory, the assimilation of old and new information has the ability to cause vulnerable memories to become distorted. This is also known as the misinformation effect (Loftus, 1997). It is not uncommon for individuals to fill in memory gaps with what they assume they must have experienced. We not only distort memories for events that we have observed, but, we may also have false memories for events that never occurred at all. False memories are “often created by combing actual memories with suggestions received from

There is also evidence against Flashbulb memories such as firstly it cannot be proved whether the participants are telling the truth or lying about an event since everyone's interpretation of where they were etc will be different, so it cannot be proved whether it is a flashbulb memory or just a memory. Secondly it is also difficult to prove how accurate flashbulb memories are since they all have different degrees of significance to people too so certain people will remember less or more and others will forget parts of the memory where as others will not. Thirdly with large events such as

Recollections of vivid autobiographical episodic memories formed when an individual experiences intense emotions, generating from a surprising public event defines Flashbulb memories (FBMs). Permanent and consistent remembrances processed cognitively and stored as explicit recollections in long term memory are additional features of FBMs (Goldstein, 2014). Brown & Kulik (1977) first proposed this phenomenon and argued FBMs are resistant to change like photographs. The ongoing debate over the process of cognition in relation to storing and recalling FBMs led numerous researchers to advance their understanding of the mental processing of FBMs and to evaluate the impact emotions have on memories. This paper discusses the pioneer investigation and findings from Brown & Kulik’s 1977. It further explores debates opposing their unique theory of FBMs and the apparent inadequacies of their conclusions. Additionally, this paper examines plausible hypotheses from researchers for the formation of FBMs like rehearsal of events and the inconsistencies of FBMs, their distortions and the decay FBMs experience over time. It then evaluates a contemporary study on FBMs and the necessity for future studies to develop a method to measure FBMs. This is imperative in order to gain a deeper understanding of the influences emotions have on shaping, processing and storing FBMs cognitively and consequently how it impacts on our daily lives.