Search research articles

ABOUT JoVE

Overview Leadership Blog JoVE Help Center

AUTHORS

Publishing Process Editorial Board Scope & Policies Peer Review FAQ Submit

LIBRARIANS

Testimonials Subscriptions Access Resources Library Advisory Board FAQ

RESEARCH

JoVE Journal Methods Collections JoVE Encyclopedia of Experiments Archive

EDUCATION

JoVE Core JoVE Business JoVE Science Education JoVE Lab Manual Faculty Resource Center Faculty Site

Terms & Conditions of Use

Related Concept Videos

False Memories

False Memories

False memories represent a cognitive distortion in which individuals recall events that did not happen, or remember them in an altered form. This phenomenon highlights the brain's constructive nature in processing and recalling memories, emphasizing that memory is not a perfect representation of past events but rather a dynamic reconstruction influenced by various factors.
One primary source of false memories is misattribution, where individuals incorrectly associate external information with...

CNS Depressants: Alcohol and Nicotine

CNS Depressants: Alcohol and Nicotine

Ethanol, a clear colorless alcohol, has been consumed by humans for millennia, but its effects on the body are far from benign. At lower doses, it induces decreased inhibitions and loquaciousness, leading to its social appeal. However, it can cause severe consequences at higher doses, such as coma and respiratory depression, due to its zero-order elimination kinetics. Chronic ethanol abuse wreaks havoc on multiple organ systems, particularly the CNS and the liver. Abrupt cessation of ethanol...

Implicit Memories

Implicit Memories

Implicit memories, also known as non-declarative memories, are long-term memories that function outside of conscious awareness. These memories influence behavior and skills without explicit knowledge. This type of memory is evident in tasks like playing tennis, snowboarding, and texting. Implicit memory has three subsystems: procedural memory, conditioning, and priming. This type of memory is essential in various activities, from everyday tasks to specialized skills.
One key aspect of implicit...

Self-Presentation: Self-Monitoring and Self-Handicapping

Self-Presentation: Self-Monitoring and Self-Handicapping

People can go to great lengths to protect their self-image and present themselves in ways that they want others to see them. Sociologist Erving Goffman presented the idea that a person is like an actor on a stage. Calling his theory dramaturgy, Goffman believed that we use “impression management” to present ourselves to others as we hope to be perceived. Each situation is a new scene, and individuals perform different roles depending on who is present (Goffman, 1959). Think about the way you...

Cognitive Dissonance

Cognitive Dissonance

Social psychologists have documented that feeling good about ourselves and maintaining positive self-esteem is a powerful motivator of human behavior (Tavris & Aronson, 2008). In the United States, members of the predominant culture typically think very highly of themselves and view themselves as good people who are above average on many desirable traits (Ehrlinger, Gilovich, & Ross, 2005). Often, our behavior, attitudes, and beliefs are affected when we experience a threat to our...

Eyewitness Memory

Eyewitness Memory

Eyewitness memory refers to the recollection of events by someone who has directly witnessed them, often serving as critical evidence in legal settings. This type of memory is commonly used in criminal cases where a witness describes details like a suspect's appearance, clothing, or behavior during a crime. However, despite its perceived reliability, eyewitness memory is prone to significant errors.
One such error is memory distortion, which occurs because human memory does not function like a...

You might also read

Related Articles

Articles linked to this work by shared authors, journal, and citation graph.

Sort by

Same author

Dopamine mediates a directionally opposite correlation between empathy and the reinforcing effects of amphetamine and gambling in people with gambling disorder vs. healthy controls.

Pharmacology, biochemistry, and behavior·2024

Same author

Generational Immigration Status Modifies the Association Between Psychosocial Distress and Substance Use Among Alternative High School Students.

The Journal of adolescent health : official publication of the Society for Adolescent Medicine·2024

Same author

Adolescent's explicit and implicit cigarette cognitions predict experimentation with both cigarettes and e-cigarettes.

The American journal of drug and alcohol abuse·2024

Same author

Underage Alcohol Use by Intersectional Identity Among Alternative High School Students.

The Journal of adolescent health : official publication of the Society for Adolescent Medicine·2023

Same author

A quantitative survey measure of moral evaluations of patient substance misuse among health professionals in California, urban France, and urban China.

Philosophy, ethics, and humanities in medicine : PEHM·2023

Same author

Association of cannabis use with neurocognition in adolescents with bipolar disorder.

Journal of psychopharmacology (Oxford, England)·2023

Search research articles

Related Experiment Video

Updated: Jun 27, 2026

A Prediction Error-driven Retrieval Procedure for Destabilizing and Rewriting Maladaptive Reward Memories in Hazardous Drinkers

A Prediction Error-driven Retrieval Procedure for Destabilizing and Rewriting Maladaptive Reward Memories in Hazardous Drinkers

Published on: January 5, 2018

Context effects and false memory for alcohol words in adolescents.

Martin Zack¹, Justin Sharpley, Clyde W Dent

¹Clinical Neuroscience Section, Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, 33 Russell Street, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M5S 2S1. martin_zack@camh.net

Addictive Behaviors

|December 17, 2008

Summary

Adolescents exposed to alcohol words showed similar false recognition for alcohol and neutral terms. Alcohol TV ads increased false recognition, particularly for alcohol-related words in males and anxious teens.

More Related Videos

The Use of Trace Eyeblink Classical Conditioning to Assess Hippocampal Dysfunction in a Rat Model of Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders

The Use of Trace Eyeblink Classical Conditioning to Assess Hippocampal Dysfunction in a Rat Model of Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders

Published on: August 5, 2017

The Deese-Roediger-McDermott (DRM) Task: A Simple Cognitive Paradigm to Investigate False Memories in the Laboratory

The Deese-Roediger-McDermott (DRM) Task: A Simple Cognitive Paradigm to Investigate False Memories in the Laboratory

Published on: January 31, 2017

Related Experiment Videos

Last Updated: Jun 27, 2026

A Prediction Error-driven Retrieval Procedure for Destabilizing and Rewriting Maladaptive Reward Memories in Hazardous Drinkers

A Prediction Error-driven Retrieval Procedure for Destabilizing and Rewriting Maladaptive Reward Memories in Hazardous Drinkers

Published on: January 5, 2018

The Use of Trace Eyeblink Classical Conditioning to Assess Hippocampal Dysfunction in a Rat Model of Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders

The Use of Trace Eyeblink Classical Conditioning to Assess Hippocampal Dysfunction in a Rat Model of Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders

Published on: August 5, 2017

The Deese-Roediger-McDermott (DRM) Task: A Simple Cognitive Paradigm to Investigate False Memories in the Laboratory

The Deese-Roediger-McDermott (DRM) Task: A Simple Cognitive Paradigm to Investigate False Memories in the Laboratory

Published on: January 31, 2017

Area of Science:

Cognitive Psychology
Adolescent Psychology
Media Psychology

Background:

Adolescent alcohol misuse is a significant public health concern.
Perceptual biases may influence drinking norms and subsequent alcohol misuse.
Incidental memory and distraction effects are crucial in understanding cognitive biases.

Purpose of the Study:

To assess incidental recognition of alcohol and neutral words in adolescents under distraction.
To investigate the influence of alcohol-related media exposure on false memory.
To examine demographic and psychological predictors of false memory for alcohol words.

Main Methods:

171 tenth-grade students (ages 14-16) participated in a telephone-based study.
Participants encoded words (alcohol and neutral, or neutral only) while performing a distractor task (counting backwards).
Immediate recognition testing assessed false memory rates for different word types.

Main Results:

Control group showed higher false recognition for neutral than alcohol words.
Experimental group (exposed to alcohol words) had equivalent false recognition rates for both word types.
Alcohol TV ad exposure predicted increased false recognition, especially for alcohol words in the experimental group. Males and high anxiety-sensitive participants showed greater false memory for alcohol words.

Conclusions:

Distraction during encoding influences false memory for alcohol-related stimuli in adolescents.
Exposure to alcohol advertising may exacerbate false memory biases, potentially contributing to exaggerated perceptions of drinking norms.
These findings highlight context-dependent memory biases that may link to alcohol misuse in young drinkers.