Childhood memories are particularly vulnerable to manipulation.
Image: Plainpicture
Many people are convinced that they can recall events from their earliest childhood. Under certain conditions, memory can certainly be misled. In this way, even traumas that never existed can be remembered.
MSometimes they appear again, seemingly out of nowhere, the faded images from childhood: There was that balloon ride that you experienced years ago and seemed to have completely forgotten. Suddenly you remember the view, the wind and the colors of the balloon. But this event never happened: in a study, the American memory researcher Elizabeth Loftus was able to get half of her subjects to remember the fictional event. To do this, she showed them fake photos of a balloon ride that they supposedly experienced in their childhood.
Such false memories are not uncommon. Many people are convinced that they can recall events from their earliest childhood. For example, they report on their own first steps or the birth of a sibling.
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