People struggle to differentiate between real and claimed fake memories by others
False memories aren’t just convincing to people who have them, but to outside observers who hear them.
The authors of a 2020 study recorded people who recounted real and false childhood memories that were successfully implanted earlier, such as getting bit by a dog. They then showed these recordings to a second group to people and asked them to guess whether the memory was true or not. The observers were slightly better at guessing a real memory (about 60%), but were no better than chance at telling apart a fake recollection.
