The Designer’s Den: Misinformation & False Memories Children vs Adults

The Designer’s Den – Children are less Vulnerable to Misinformation and False Memories Compared to Adults Contrary to Criminologists, Lawyers, and Fact-finders’ Assumptions
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The Designer’s Den – Children are less Vulnerable to Misinformation and False Memories Compared to Adults Contrary to Criminologists, Lawyers, and Fact-finders’ Assumptions
Society has often perceived children as remarkably prone to misinformation and false memories and would readily admit to external influences due to their developmental stage and general vulnerabilities compared to adults. This observation has led researchers, criminologists, lawyers, and fact-finders to affirmatively argue that children are largely prone to create false memories of events they have not experienced and would, therefore, serve as inferior witnesses in the criminal justice system. Nevertheless, recent research demonstrates that children are less vulnerable to constructing false memories and accepting external suggestive questions in testimonies compared to adults (Otgaar et al., 2019). In accounting for the difference in the construction of false memories among children and adults, researchers have relied on constructivism and fuzzy-trace theory (FTT) to predict and identify true and false memories in different events (Reyna et al. 2016). For instance, Reyna et al (2016) have argued that FTT attempts to unify and refine information-process and constructivist models through the reliance on a distinction between meaning-based, vague memory and the precise, literal representations that improve with human development. From the perspective of criminal justice law and juvenile psychology, studies including Bala et al (2005), Randell et al (2017), and Pantell et al (2017) children have always appeared in court as witnesses and provided compelling testimonies critical to the justice process. Like adults, children have the inherent mental travel time (MTT) ability, which has evolved in non-primate animals as well as in rats and scrub-jays (Roberts & Feeney, 2009). However, human memory is distinguishable by how long ago an event happened from animal memory concerned with when the event occurred (Roberts & Feeney, 2009). Understanding that children can also serve as court witnesses, sometimes better than adults due to their less vulnerability to misinformation and false memories is critical in appreciating the evolution of human mental time travel, which is observed among members in the animal kingdom.
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To examine the differences in vulnerability among children and adults when exposed to information and false memory suggestions, this hypothetical study employed two sets of participants: children aged between 8-12 years and adults between 20-22 years. 6 children and 6 adults were randomly selected from XYZ township. The inclusion criteria included age to observe the differences in development stage and gender to balance for both female and male participants. All participants were informed about the study although specific questions were not provided prior to the experiment. All ethical guidelines were followed to ensure that the questions did not cause any mental strain among the ...