Phenomenal characteristics of co-created guided imagery and autobiographical memories

Concern has recently been raised about the potential for guided images to be mistaken for memories of actual events. According to the reality-monitoring framework, such misattributions can occur due to the similarity of sensory and reflective memory characteristics acquired at encoding, or due to source judgement processes at retrieval. A study was conducted to examine the similarity of guided images and perceived memories at imagery encoding, and after a short delay. Participants rated the characteristics of an actual event, a natural imagery event (e.g. a fantasy), and a guided imagery experience, immediately and after a one-week interval. For each condition, participants discussed their memory or guided imagery experience with the researcher as they reviewed or created it. Ratings indicated that guided imagery was similar to perceived memory with respect to sensory characteristics. However, the factors associated with supporting memories (contextual and temporal detail, setting familiarity, and recollection of surrounding events) were less vivid for guided imagery than for perceived events. In all cases, these patterns were stable over time. Copyright (C) 2003 John Wiley Sons, Ltd.