Memory [JOURNAL]
Sun
200 papers
Audience tuning effects on communicators' memory: the role of the communicator's own initial judgment.
Wagner U, Echterhoff G
Memory · 2025 Aug · PMID 40700613 · Publisher ↗
Human memory is susceptible to various biases, often resulting from social interaction and communication. One example is the "saying-is-believing" (SIB) effect, where a communicator's memory is evaluatively biased by the...
Human memory is susceptible to various biases, often resulting from social interaction and communication. One example is the "saying-is-believing" (SIB) effect, where a communicator's memory is evaluatively biased by the previous tuning of messages about a target towards their audience's attitude, an effect explained by the communicator's shared reality creation with the audience. According to previous theorising (Echterhoff & Higgins, 2017), the communicators' initial, audience-independent judgments of a target are also likely to affect the evaluative tone of their subsequent memory. We investigated, for the first time, the role of the communicator's own judgment (OJ) as a possible moderator of the audience-congruent memory bias. Across three studies (total = 1,070 participants), participants' OJs shaped the evaluative tone of their memory. However, there was no evidence that the audience-congruent recall bias depended on whether participants had initially formed a neutral or a valenced (positive or negative) own judgment of a target person. Hence, the audience-congruent memory bias persisted regardless of communicators' own initial judgments. We discuss implications for the study of memory and social influence. The findings are relevant for everyday life, given that people often talk about topics about which they have already formed their own judgment.
An examination of the cognitive processes related to eyewitness lineup decisions.
Mansour JK, Stepan ME, Berkowitz SR … +2 more , Peltier C, Fenn KM
Memory · 2025 Aug · PMID 40699897 · Full text
Given the magnitude of errors in the criminal justice system, it is vital to increase our capacity to predict when an eyewitness is likely to be accurate. The aim of this work was to examine cognitive processes important...
Given the magnitude of errors in the criminal justice system, it is vital to increase our capacity to predict when an eyewitness is likely to be accurate. The aim of this work was to examine cognitive processes important for correct lineup responses and to develop a theoretically-driven model of the relative strength of these processes and the interactions between them for predicting the likelihood of an accurate lineup decision. We used sleep to manipulate memory strength and assessed decision process objectively, using eye tracking, and subjectively, using a questionnaire. We then modelled the influence of memory strength and decision process on correct identifications in a target-present lineup (Experiment 1) and correct rejections in a target-absent lineup (Experiment 2). Our subjective measure of decision process was the only predictor of correct identifications. Memory strength and decision process predicted the likelihood of correct rejections, and did so largely independently from one another, but the subjective measure was the stronger predictor. Combining the data from both experiments suggested that decision processes mediate the relationship between memory strength and identification accuracy. These results can inform theories of how cognitive processes interact to influence lineup decisions.
Lexical-semantic support of verbal short-term memory under phonological demand: evidence for persistent imageability effects in immediate serial recall under rapid presentation and in dyslexic adults.
Metz C, Savill N
Memory · 2025 Sep · PMID 40690437 · Publisher ↗
Verbal short-term memory (vSTM) draws on both phonological and lexical-semantic systems. This study examined whether vSTM support from semantic properties - specifically word imageability - varies with phonological abili...
Verbal short-term memory (vSTM) draws on both phonological and lexical-semantic systems. This study examined whether vSTM support from semantic properties - specifically word imageability - varies with phonological ability and whether it endures rapid encoding conditions. Two auditory immediate serial recall (ISR) experiments tested recall for high - and low-imageability word lists in adults with and without developmental dyslexia. In Experiment 1, word imageability effects in standard presentation ISR were robust and equivalent across groups, despite the context of lower nonword recall in dyslexic participants. Experiment 2 used speeded presentation to limit rehearsal and reduce strategic encoding. Imageability effects were still observed, and a moderate association emerged between imageability benefit and nonword recall, which had not been observed with standard rate presentation. However, there remained no group-level differences in word recall. These findings indicate that imageability supports vSTM performance across individuals and task conditions. They do not provide strong evidence for compensatory mechanisms but rather highlight the general stability of semantic support in verbal memory across conditions.
Circadian dynamics of explicit memory performance in youth: exploring chronotype and synchrony effects.
Bettencourt C, Pires L, Vilar M … +5 more , Almeida F, Samarra S, Duarte R, Allen Gomes A, Leitão J
Memory · 2025 Sep · PMID 40684440 · Publisher ↗
Cognitive performance oscillates throughout the day depending on an individual's chronotype, with synchrony effects being reported in memory performance. To examine these effects in an ecologically-valid setting, 74 chil...
Cognitive performance oscillates throughout the day depending on an individual's chronotype, with synchrony effects being reported in memory performance. To examine these effects in an ecologically-valid setting, 74 children (= 8.39years, = .54; 34 morning-types, 40 evening-types) and 79 adolescents (= 13.05years, = .39; 41 morning-types, 38 evening-types) were selected based on chronotype. Participants underwent neuropsychological assessments in school on the first or last hour of the school day, with testing times randomised. About half of each chronotype-group was assessed in the morning and the other half in the afternoon. The protocol included measures of explicit memory, namely verbal episodic memory, visuospatial working memory, and semantic memory. Synchrony effects were found in episodic verbal memory for morning-type adolescents and visuospatial working memory for evening-types of both age groups. Main effects of chronotype were found only for episodic verbal memory, with contrasting patterns: morning-type children outperformed evening-type children, whereas for adolescents the effect of chronotype favoured evening-types and was modulated by the synchrony effect. No interaction or main effects of chronotype and time-of-day were found for semantic memory. Our findings suggest developmental specificities in how circadian preferences impact memory and underscore the potential benefits of aligning schedules with individual chronobiological profiles to optimise learning outcomes.
Gaslighting and memory: the effects of partner-led challenges on recall and self-perception.
Darke L, Paterson H, van Golde C
Memory · 2025 Aug · PMID 40673655 · Publisher ↗
The global introduction of coercive control laws addressing patterns of psychological abuse in intimate partner violence has made it increasingly important to understand the cognitive impacts of tactics like gaslighting....
The global introduction of coercive control laws addressing patterns of psychological abuse in intimate partner violence has made it increasingly important to understand the cognitive impacts of tactics like gaslighting. Gaslighting directly targets cognitive processes involved in evaluating memories, potentially undermining victim-survivors' recollection, confidence, and self-trust, which are critical in forensic processes such as testimony. This study examined the effects of partner-led challenges on autobiographical memories within close relationships (i.e., friends and couples). It adapted memory conformity paradigms to capture gaslighting dynamics, where one partner pressures the other to adopt a different recollection of shared events. The study assessed how this pressure influences recall, confidence, self-perception, and wellbeing. It also explored how relationship factors (e.g., closeness, length) predict changes in recall. Results showed pressure from close partners increased misinformation acceptance, emphasising the role of interpersonal dynamics in memory conformity and the potential for abusive partners to manipulate recollections. While recall confidence decreased, self-esteem and mood showed positive trends, indicating complex interactions in processing memory challenges. These findings highlight the need for further research into psychological manipulation's effect on memory and self-trust in IPV, with focus on improving forensic responses and interventions for victim-survivors of psychological abuse.
Trauma memories with and without moral conflict: characteristics, centrality, and associations with posttraumatic stress.
Mooren N, de la Rie SM, Boelen PA
Memory · 2025 Aug · PMID 40650337 · Publisher ↗
The significance of moral conflicts that emerge during traumatic events and their influence on posttraumatic stress (PTS) and related symptoms are increasingly recognised. However, characteristics of the memories of thes...
The significance of moral conflicts that emerge during traumatic events and their influence on posttraumatic stress (PTS) and related symptoms are increasingly recognised. However, characteristics of the memories of these conflicts and how central these memories are within autobiographical memory remain largely unclear. In this study, students recalling trauma memories with a moral conflict were compared to students whose trauma memories did not include a moral conflict, in terms of the event-centrality of the trauma memory, memory characteristics, current emotional distress, and PTS. Additionally, we examined to what extent event-centrality was associated with PTS and memory characteristics. Participants recalling trauma memories with a moral conflict referred to these memories as more central, self-defining, and were more often recalled from observer perspective with greater self-distance compared to participants recalling trauma memories without moral conflict. The former group experienced more shame, guilt, disgust, and horror during the traumatic event and reported more PTS and current emotional distress. Event-centrality was positively correlated with PTS. This study highlights that event-centrality and memory characteristics play an important role in trauma memories with moral conflict.
Autobiographical memory specificity in younger and older adults as a function of cue type.
Kim H, Harris CB, Barber SJ
Memory · 2025 Aug · PMID 40607728 · Publisher ↗
Autobiographical memory specificity commonly declines with age, but the role of emotion in modulating this deficit is unclear. Prior studies have typically used the Autobiographical Memory Test (AMT) paradigm and have as...
Autobiographical memory specificity commonly declines with age, but the role of emotion in modulating this deficit is unclear. Prior studies have typically used the Autobiographical Memory Test (AMT) paradigm and have asked younger and older participants to produce autobiographical memories in response to emotional and neutral cue words. However, these studies have often confounded cue valence with cue concreteness. To address this problem, in this study younger and older adults completed an AMT task that used negative, neutral, and positive cue words, which were either abstract or concrete. Results showed an age-related decline in autobiographical memory specificity, but the magnitude of this deficit depended upon cue type. For abstract cue words, older adults' autobiographical memory specificity was lower than that of younger adults for the negative and neutral cues, but there was no age difference in specificity for the positive cues, a finding that aligns with other reports of age-related positivity effects. In contrast, for concrete cue words, cue valence did not impact autobiographical memory specificity, with similar age differences in specificity for all three cue valences. These findings highlight the importance of considering characteristics of the AMT cues when evaluating autobiographical memory specificity for younger and older adults.
Context-switching in short-form videos: What is the impact on prospective memory?
Barton N, Smyth M
Memory · 2025 Aug · PMID 40553577 · Publisher ↗
Short-form video domains, such as TikTok, may have a degenerate impact on Prospective Memory (PM) performance. This is due to the fast context-switching features that short-form videos present. This study examines the hy...
Short-form video domains, such as TikTok, may have a degenerate impact on Prospective Memory (PM) performance. This is due to the fast context-switching features that short-form videos present. This study examines the hypothesis that fast context-switching while watching short-form videos contributes to a cognitive decline. The pace of context-switching is the speed at which participants switch between videos. A between-groups design was used with three conditions that varied the pace of context-switching: (1) unlimited context-switching, (2) limited context-switching and (3) control (no short-form video stimulus). Participants' cognitive ability was measured pre and post-video viewing through a combined Lexical Decision (LD) and PM task. Participants ( = 45) were recruited using an experimental participation scheme. To test the hypothesis, linear mixed models were conducted, with LD and PM task response time and accuracy as the criterion and the three context-switching conditions as the predictors. Participants in the unlimited context-switching condition had significantly deteriorated PM performance post-interruption, whereas the limited switching condition had significantly improved PM performance post-interruption. Therefore, fast context-switching is identified as an underlying factor behind PM decline following short-form video use. This could inform the case for the regulation of media platforms with fast context-switching features.
Are influencers more influential? Social endorsement and memory on social media.
Bilgin E, Wang Q
Memory · 2025 Jul · PMID 40549971 · Publisher ↗
The present research examined the mnemonic consequences of social endorsement in the form of followers and likes. In four studies, participants were presented with simulated social media posts associated with high and lo...
The present research examined the mnemonic consequences of social endorsement in the form of followers and likes. In four studies, participants were presented with simulated social media posts associated with high and low levels of social endorsement. In Studies 1 and 2, participants read tweets about COVID-19 (Study 1; = 199) and Facebook status updates about positive and negative personal events (Study 2, = 159) posted by users with large or small numbers of followers. In Studies 3 and 4, participants read the posts (tweets in Study 3, = 158; Facebook status updates in Study 4, = 177) that received large or small numbers of likes. Across all studies, regardless of cultural background and social conformity tendency, social endorsement did not affect memory performance for posted information: Although participants rated profiles with greater social endorsement as more popular, trustworthy, likable, and attractive, they remembered the posted information associated with high and low levels of social endorsement similarly. Participants better remembered negative information (Studies 2 and 4) and information posted by more likable users (Studies 1 and 3). The findings suggest that social endorsement alone, while influencing the perception of profile owners, does not enhance the memorability of the associated information.
Correction.
Memory · 2025 Aug · PMID 40531201 · Publisher ↗
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Intentions to forget and the importance of interference: further tests of the strategic retrieval account of recent list-method directed forgetting.
Gilbert LT, Delaney PF
Memory · 2025 Jul · PMID 40515662 · Publisher ↗
Several list-method directed forgetting studies found that people can forget the most recent of two lists when instructed to, a phenomenon termed . The present paper tested predictions from [Gilbert, L. T., Delaney, P. F...
Several list-method directed forgetting studies found that people can forget the most recent of two lists when instructed to, a phenomenon termed . The present paper tested predictions from [Gilbert, L. T., Delaney, P. F., & Racsmány, M. (2023). People sometimes remember to forget: Strategic retrieval from the list before last enables directed forgetting of the most recent information. , (6), 900-925. https://doi.org/10.1037/xlm0001178] strategic retrieval account of recent directed forgetting, which proposes that people try to forget the most recent list by retrieving earlier-studied items, creating interference and new learning necessary to forget. Experiments 1 and 2 confirmed the prediction that without intentions to forget, instructions to retrieve List 1 promote forgetting of List 2. Experiments 3 and 4 tested anticipated boundary conditions of strategic retrieval. First, recognition testing eliminated the forgetting effect (Experiment 3). Second, categorised lists were expected to allow forgetting only when both lists were drawn from the same semantic category, as opposed to unrelated categories (Experiment 4). Contrary to our prediction, categorised lists showed significant forgetting under both conditions, despite reducing interference. The results suggest a dissociation between changing context via retrieval of earlier context and the process of "setting" context by studying new items after a context change.
Exploring age-related changes in episodic memory: contributions of a multimodal memory task.
Launay A, Taconnat L, Brachet M … +3 more , Matysiak A, Vanneste S, Baudouin A
Memory · 2025 Aug · PMID 40498960 · Publisher ↗
While the decline in episodic memory with aging is well-documented, few studies have conducted a detailed analysis of the content of the recall in an experience that closely mimics a real-life situation. The objective of...
While the decline in episodic memory with aging is well-documented, few studies have conducted a detailed analysis of the content of the recall in an experience that closely mimics a real-life situation. The objective of the present study was to compare the recall of young adults, young-old and oldest-old adults using a multimodal paradigm involving the viewing of a short movie. We compared quantitative scores of free recall and deepened recall (guided recall using a semi-structured interview). We analyzed profile scores relative to the distribution of each episodic element into the deepened recall. Data from 60 young adults (20-35 years), 56 young-old adults (60-74 years) and 37 oldest-old adults (75-91 years) indicated significant age-related declines in recall performance. An analysis of the recall structure revealed that oldest-old adults report significantly more episodic elements related to actions than young adults. Besides, compared to both young adults and young-old adults, oldest-old adults reported significantly fewer details related to verbal conversations which require more perceptual specifics. These findings highlight the importance of detailed recall analyses to better understand how the formation of episodic memory may gradually change with age.
Beliefs about inaccessible memories of childhood sexual abuse: a survey of laypeople and professionals.
Sonne T, Faber P, Nielsen NP … +2 more , Kingo OS, Berntsen D
Memory · 2025 Jul · PMID 40498477 · Publisher ↗
Evidence indicates that perceived event plausibility influences the likelihood of false memory implantation. Accordingly, it is central to map out the beliefs that people hold regarding the plausibility of different even...
Evidence indicates that perceived event plausibility influences the likelihood of false memory implantation. Accordingly, it is central to map out the beliefs that people hold regarding the plausibility of different events. In three studies, we examined beliefs concerning the plausibility of being unable to remember childhood sexual abuse by use of two vignettes. This was investigated in Danish (Study 1; 94) and American laypeople (Study 2; 303) and Danish professionals across six different groups of potential relevance to the legal system (Study 3; = 335). Most participants in Studies 1 and 2 answered either "Plausible" or "Very plausible" to both vignettes, replicating previous findings. In Study 3, the majority of professionals endorsed the belief that it is plausible to have inaccessible memories of childhood sexual abuse, but it varied across professional groups how strong the belief was, with highest scores among police and social workers. Our findings suggest that both laypeople and professionals typically hold the belief that an inability to remember the traumatic event is a likely and common reaction to childhood sexual abuse. The findings are important for informing the recurrent debate concerning repressed memories of childhood sexual abuse.
Memory sharing on social media in the Arabic context.
Camia C, Wang Q
Memory · 2025 Jul · PMID 40454962 · Publisher ↗
Social media has transformed memory sharing into a virtual and public interaction, yet little is known about why individuals share memories online and how this relates to the features of their shared memories or their we...
Social media has transformed memory sharing into a virtual and public interaction, yet little is known about why individuals share memories online and how this relates to the features of their shared memories or their well-being. We examined these questions in a student sample (study 1, = 120, = 22.47, 85.83% female) and a community sample (study 2, = 102, = 28.24, 60.78% female) in the United Arab Emirates, where social media usage is widespread. Results showed that, consistent with findings from other non-Western cultures, Arab youth share memories on social media more for directive than other purposes, whereas Arab adults share memories equally for all purposes. Furthermore, purposes for sharing personal experiences on social media were related to actual social media use and, when aligned with cultural orientation, contributed to well-being. Overall, these findings provide novel insights into the purposes of online memory sharing in an understudied cultural context and support the person-culture-fit framework positing that culture-congruent remembering promotes well-being.
Evidence of the age-related positivity bias in autobiographical memories of the 2020 United States Presidential election outcome.
Siedlecki KL, Falzarano F, Yazdani N … +1 more , Minahan Zucchetto J
Memory · 2025 Jul · PMID 40440486 · Full text
The current study examines the age-related positivity bias and the age-related positivity effect using a one-year longitudinal design with a sample that spans adulthood ( = 374; age range 19-90; = 47.41; = 16.75). Parti...
The current study examines the age-related positivity bias and the age-related positivity effect using a one-year longitudinal design with a sample that spans adulthood ( = 374; age range 19-90; = 47.41; = 16.75). Participants answered questions regarding their memories of learning about the outcome of the 2020 U.S. presidential election. Results provide evidence for the positivity bias (i.e., a main effect of age) but no evidence of the positivity effect (i.e., an age x valence interaction). Increased age was associated with reporting feeling less negative at the time of the event, and also remembering feeling more positive (elated and happy) when reconstructing the event one year later. Depressive symptoms partially mediated the relationship between age and valence variables, indicating that depressive symptoms may partly explain the age-related positivity bias.
Impoverished recall of sensory details along infrequently travelled routes in aphantasia.
Li A, Arrieta M, Levine B … +1 more , Rosenbaum RS
Memory · 2025 Jul · PMID 40425187 · Publisher ↗
Visual imagery is important for recalling environmental details, but individuals with aphantasia are reported to show intact spatial memory. We investigated spatial memories of previously experienced environments in indi...
Visual imagery is important for recalling environmental details, but individuals with aphantasia are reported to show intact spatial memory. We investigated spatial memories of previously experienced environments in individuals with and without aphantasia using self-report and route description tasks. Aphantasic participants ( = 113) and controls ( = 110) completed questionnaires on spatial navigation, memory, anxiety, and mood. A subgroup (aphantasic: = 65, control: = 72) completed a route description task assessing memory for details along frequently and infrequently travelled routes. Aphantasic participants did not differ significantly from controls on self-reported navigation ability or strategies. Both groups recalled similar numbers of spatial, entity, and sensory details when describing frequently travelled routes. However, aphantasic participants recalled fewer sensory details for infrequently travelled routes. This finding was corroborated by nominally lower ratings on self-reported memory for object locations and new routes. Findings suggest that spatial memory, including sensory content, remains intact in aphantasia for frequent routes. Impoverished sensory details for infrequent routes indicates that individuals with aphantasia may rely on compensatory strategies, like semanticization, for frequently experienced environments. This suggests that spatial memory for real-world environments involve dissociable processes, some of which are independent of imagery.
Evidence for proactive interference effects in repetitive checking tasks.
Burns DJ, Chen N, Zhu KX … +2 more , Jia SX, Tegiacchi R
Memory · 2025 May · PMID 40415718 · Publisher ↗
Why does repeatedly checking one's actions, a common behaviour of those with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), undermine memory confidence? The most accepted explanation is that repetitive checking decreases confidenc...
Why does repeatedly checking one's actions, a common behaviour of those with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), undermine memory confidence? The most accepted explanation is that repetitive checking decreases confidence by increasing familiarity with the task, leading to the encoding of fewer perceptual details. We argue that checking, per se, does not decrease memory confidence. Rather, the experimental procedure that has been used to assess checking across repeated trials induces proactive interference (PI), causing the drop in confidence. We conducted three experiments in which participants repeatedly checked three different food items in a virtual refrigerator, with memory accuracy and confidence tested after the first and last trials. All three experiments showed that recall of the items presented on each trial, and confidence in the accuracy of the recalled items, decreased across trials, implying a build-up of PI. Experiments 2 and 3 also demonstrated that providing a category cue on the last trial eliminated the decline, suggesting a release from PI. Moreover, Experiment 3 showed that checking within a specific trial increased accuracy and confidence. This result suggests that the decline across trials is due to PI and that checking, per se, improves accuracy and confidence. Implications for individuals with OCD are discussed.
The trigger mechanism of the target detection task influencing recognition memory at Stimulus Onset Asynchrony of 0.5 s: evidence from the remember-know paradigm.
Shang C, Sun M, Zhang Q
Memory · 2025 Jul · PMID 40396476 · Publisher ↗
Individuals showed better memory performance for target-paired items compared to distractor-paired items during sequential target detection and memory encoding tasks, a phenomenon called target-paired memory enhancement...
Individuals showed better memory performance for target-paired items compared to distractor-paired items during sequential target detection and memory encoding tasks, a phenomenon called target-paired memory enhancement (TPME). The TPME was considered to be triggered by the response when the detection stimulus preceded the memory item by 0.5 s without temporal overlap. However, this hypothesis has not been empirically verified. To test the hypothesis, we instructed participants to detect the target colour before memorizing words, varying the response requirements for the target colour across different tasks. Participants responded only to the target colour in the Go-target-0.5 s task (SOA = 0.5 s) and Go-target-1 s task (SOA = 1 s), to distractor colours in the No-Go-target task, and to all colours with different keys in the response-choice task. The results of the remember-know recognition test showed that TPME was consistent across all tasks for R responses, but only occurred in the Go-target-0.5 s task for corrected K responses. These results suggested that both target detection and response can independently contribute to TPME when the detection stimulus and the memory item were presented successively without temporal overlap. The target detection enhanced recollection and familiarity, while the response enhanced familiarity. The effect on recollection was lasting, while the effect on familiarity was transient.
Remember when? The retrieval of early childhood memories in black and white American young adults.
Slonecker EM, Kamliot DZ, Klemfuss JZ … +1 more , Wang Q
Memory · 2025 Jul · PMID 40377657 · Publisher ↗
Culture and gender influence adults' ability to retrieve early memories. Previous research has mainly focused on White and Asian samples, leaving Black Americans understudied despite distinctive socialisation practices t...
Culture and gender influence adults' ability to retrieve early memories. Previous research has mainly focused on White and Asian samples, leaving Black Americans understudied despite distinctive socialisation practices that could influence memory retrieval within and across gender. This study examined memory retrieval in Black ( = 97, 67% female) and White ( = 98, 77% female) participants ( = 21.65 years). Participants were given five minutes to recall memories from their first five years. They then estimated their age at each event and rated the memories on various dimensions. We hypothesised that Black participants and women would retrieve more and earlier memories and rate them as more robust but less independently remembered, with more pronounced gender differences in the White sample. Results partially supported our hypotheses. Black participants recalled more memories, marginally earlier first memories, and rated their memories as more important and independently remembered than White participants. White men reported the lowest scores for memory rehearsal and vividness. These patterns also varied by memory age. This study is the first to compare early memory retrieval between Black and White Americans using a memory fluency task, revealing previously undocumented autobiographical memory differences.
The way we remember and report: an experiment testing cultural differences in eyewitness memory.
de Bruïne G, Vredeveldt A, van Koppen PJ
Memory · 2025 Jul · PMID 40371812 · Full text
More and more people report their memories in cross-cultural contexts, including eyewitness interviews. In a pre-registered experiment ( = 64), we examined cultural differences in mock eyewitness reports, comparing Sub-S...
More and more people report their memories in cross-cultural contexts, including eyewitness interviews. In a pre-registered experiment ( = 64), we examined cultural differences in mock eyewitness reports, comparing Sub-Saharan African participants to a matched Western European group. Participants were interviewed about a mock crime video. We assessed differences in the number of correct, incorrect, subjective and total details, the type of details (person, action, object, surrounding), and accuracy. European participants provided significantly more details than African participants. Surprisingly, in free recall African participants used non-significantly more words to provide non-significantly fewer details. An exploratory analysis revealed that this may be due to the fact that Africans included more information that is not directly relevant to the event, such as moral evaluations. That finding supports existing literature on cultural differences in high- versus low-context communication styles. We found no significant differences between groups in the accuracy of witness reports. Because factual details about the event are typically required for criminal investigations, future research should assess how to elicit those from African individuals. Our findings emphasise the importance of considering cultural differences in memory reports and provide insight into the mechanisms underlying such cultural differences.
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