Individual Differences in Susceptibility to False Memories for Neutral and Trauma-Related Words

People with a known propensity towards false memories may be considered less credible eyewitnesses. It is therefore important to investigate individual factors related to susceptibility to false memory development. The Deese-Roediger-McDermott (DRM) procedure involves participants remembering lists of related words. The tendency to produce critical lures - words not originally presented, but strongly related to the studied words - is considered a measure of susceptibility to false memories. Participants completed the DRM using neutral and trauma-related words along with measures of dissociation, post-traumatic cognitions and the looming cognitive style. Analyses indicated that dissociation was related to false recall for traumatic stimuli; higher levels of post-traumatic cognitions were associated with a decrease in false recognition; and looming cognitive style was related to an increase in confabulations but a decrease in false recognition. The implications of this research are discussed.