The Rise and Fall of Autobiographical Beliefs: The Effect of External Feedback on Memory in the Context of the Prisoner's Dilemma

Because of the inherent reconstructive nature of memory, both recollection and belief concerning experienced events can change dynamically because of external information. We argue that economic games that include rich social information and a controlled environment can offer unique opportunities to study memory-related phenomena in relation to external information. In this preregistered study (N = 71), we examined the effect of social feedback on changing people's autobiographical beliefs and recollections in the context of the prisoner's dilemma (PD). Participants first played single-round PD with 20 different individuals and then completed a memory test in which they identified the people they played with and their actions (cooperation or refusal) when playing with these people. Afterward, participants received false feedback on their correct memories that (a) they did not play with this person or that (b) they played with this person but misremembered their actions in the game. Finally, participants completed a second memory test where they reported their memories of the people as well as their actions again. Both types of false feedback reduced participants' beliefs as well as their recollections of the experiences. Furthermore, false feedback increased participants' false recollections and beliefs of the interactions that never happened. Our results showed that contradictory social information may play an important role in shaping memory in the context of economic games.