Remembering my worst sins: How autobiographical memory serves the updating of the conceptual self

Abstract

In this empirical study it is proposed that autobiographical memory serves the important function of updating the conceptual self. The updating is achieved by storing events that do not fit the self-image, and by adapting the concept when sufficient and consistent information is collected. Afterwards the events that gave rise to the updating may be forgotten. Such a process of slow updating implies that extreme deviations will remain exceptions, and will always be remembered as such. Most people will have a relatively positive self-image, which means that very unpleasant experiences, for which they themselves are to blame, constitute large deviations from the conceptual self. The predictions derived from this, are that very unpleasant events in which oneself played the ugly role, are better remembered than unpleasant events caused by others, or than very pieasant events. From a study on the recall of events in my own life, very unpleasant and very pleasant events were talcen and classified into two groups: self-related and other-related. It appeared that self-related unpleasant events were remembered better than any other category, confrrming the hypothesis about the updating through storage of exceptions. Some aspects of the results suggest strongly that the better recall of self-related unpleasant events is secured in the encoding stage, and not in the subsequent stages of storage and retrieval.