Emotional content of the event but not mood influences false memory

Abstract

In the present research, we used the misinformation paradigm to investigate the effects of participants' mood during encoding of an event, and the emotional content of the event on false memory. Participants were randomly assigned to one of three mood-induction groups (positive, negative, or neutral) and they all watched a video of an event that was comprised of positive, negative, and neutral scenes. Participants returned 24-h later, and were randomly assigned to one of three question groups (misleading, leading, or neutral). False memory was higher for information pertaining to the negative scenes of the event than for information pertaining to the positive scenes of the event. Mood during encoding, however, did not influence false memory of the event. These findings have important practical implications in the context of the courtroom where to-be-remembered events and witnesses' mood are often emotionally laden.