The role of guessing and boundaries on date estimation biases

Abstract

This study investigates the causes of event-dating biases. Two hundred participants provided knowledge ratings and date estimates for 64 news events. Four independent groups dated the same events under different boundary constraints. Analysis across all responses showed that forward telescoping decreased with boundary age, concurring with the boundary-effects model. With guesses removed from the data set, backward telescoping was greatly reduced, but forward telescoping was unaffected by boundaries. This dissociation indicates that multiple factors (e.g., guessing and reconstructive strategies) are responsible for different dating biases and argue against a boundary explanation of forward telescoping. Copyright 2004 Psychonomic Society, Inc.