The Seven Sins of Memory

The Seven Sins of Memory

The Seven Sins of Memory

The Seven Sins of Memory: How the Mind Forgets and Remembers is a book by Daniel Schacter, a professor of psychology at Harvard University. The book, published in 2001, explores the ways in which memory can fail us. Schacter identifies seven fundamental flaws in human memory, which he refers to as the "seven sins."

The Seven Sins

The seven sins are divided into two categories: sins of omission and sins of commission.

Sins of Omission

Sins of omission occur when we fail to bring to mind a desired fact, event, or idea.

• Transience: The decreasing accessibility of memory over time. This is a normal part of the forgetting process.
• Absent-mindedness: Lapses of attention that result in forgetting. This often occurs when we are preoccupied with other tasks.
• Blocking: The temporary inability to retrieve a memory, often referred to as the "tip-of-the-tongue" phenomenon.

Sins of Commission

Sins of commission involve the presence of unwanted or inaccurate memories.

• Misattribution: Assigning a memory to the wrong source. This can lead to false memories.
• Suggestibility: The incorporation of misinformation into memory due to leading questions, deception, or other causes.
• Bias: The influence of current knowledge, beliefs, and feelings on the recollection of previous experiences.
• Persistence: The unwanted recurrence of memories, often traumatic, that we would prefer to forget.

Impact and Applications

The concepts outlined in The Seven Sins of Memory have significant implications for various fields, including psychology, neuroscience, law, and education. Understanding these memory flaws can help in developing strategies to mitigate their effects, such as improving eyewitness testimony accuracy and enhancing learning techniques.

Related Pages

• Memory
• Cognitive psychology
• Neuroscience
• Eyewitness testimony
• False memory
• Trauma