Children's suggestion-induced omission errors are not caused by memory erasure

H.P. Otgaar*, E.H. Meijer, T.M. Giesbrecht, T. Smeets, I.E.L. Candel, H.L.G.J. Merckelbach

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleAcademicpeer-review

Abstract

We explored whether children's suggestion-induced omission errors are caused by memory erasure Seventy-five children were instructed to remove three pieces of clothing from a puppet Next, they were confronted with evidence falsely suggesting that one of the items had not been removed During two Subsequent interviews separated by one week, children had to report which pieces of clothing they had removed Children who during both interviews failed to report that they had removed the pertinent item (i e, omission error. n = 24) completed a choice reaction time task In this task, they were presented with different clothing items For each item, children had to indicate whether or not they had removed it. Significantly more errors were made for those removed items that children filled to report than for those they had not removed This indicates that children's suggestion-based omission errors are not due to erasure of memories 

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)265-269
Number of pages5
JournalConsciousness and Cognition
Volume19
Issue number1
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Mar 2010

Keywords

  • Children
  • EVENT
  • FALSE MEMORIES
  • False memories
  • Omission errors
  • RECALL
  • RECOGNITION
  • Suggestion

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