The Impact of Films on Viewer Attitudes towards People with Schizophrenia

The media, including television, newspapers, and popular films have been implicated in the facilitation of mental illness stigmatization by presenting negative and inaccurate depictions of various diagnoses. The current study examined the impact of film on participants’ knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors towards people with schizophrenia. A total of 106 participants completed questionnaires before and after viewing a 45-min film excerpt. Films viewed included a fear-based inaccurate, likeable-inaccurate, and an educational-accurate depiction of schizophrenia. There was also a control group. There were significant increases in stigmatizing attitudes for participants in the fear-based inaccurate group compared to the accurate and control group. Fear-based participants reported increased negative affect and endorsed statements suggesting that people with schizophrenia were unpredictable, dependent, and dangerous. These results provide support for the hypothesis that negative, inaccurate portrayals of severe mental illness enhance stigmatizing attitudes. Accurate film depictions, advocacy for social equality, and the continued education of individuals, clients, families, communities and organizations will help to mitigate the impact of films on mental illness stigmatization.     

Positive and Negative Effects of Monitoring Popular Films for Historical Inaccuracies

History educators often use popular films in the classroom to teach critical thinking through an exercise that involves identifying historical inaccuracies in the films. We investigated how this exercise affects the acquisition of true and false historical knowledge. In two experiments, subjects studied texts about historical topics and watched clips from corresponding films. Each film contained one piece of information that contradicted the text (i.e. misinformation). Some subjects received instructions to monitor for inaccuracies in the films. After a delay, they were tested on the texts. Monitoring instructions did not reduce subjects' acquisition of misinformation, and even when subjects successfully detected the inaccuracies, they sometimes still reproduced the misinformation. However, when they received feedback about the inaccuracies, the production of misinformation was substantially reduced. Overall, these findings indicate that educators should provide feedback when using popular films for this critical thinking exercise so that students do not acquire false knowledge. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Reducing reliance on inaccurate information

People learn from the texts that they read, but sometimes what they read is wrong. Previous research has demonstrated that individuals encode even obvious inaccuracies, at times relying on the misinformation to complete postreading tasks. In the present study, we investigated whether the influence of inaccurate information might be reduced by encouraging the retrieval of accurate knowledge. Participants read an extended text that contained both accurate and inaccurate assertions, after which they evaluated the validity of statements associated with those assertions. In general, participants made more mistakes in their evaluations of statements after having read inaccurate as compared to accurate assertions, offering evidence of the influence of misinformation. However, when participants were tasked with correcting inaccuracies during reading, their mistakes were substantially reduced. Encouraging the retrieval of accurate knowledge during reading can reduce the influence of misinformation. These findings are discussed with respect to the contributions of episodic traces and prior knowledge on learning, as well as to the conditions that support successful comprehension.     

Using Popular Films to Enhance Classroom Learning: The Good, the Bad, and the Interesting

ABSTRACT— Popular history films sometimes contain major historical inaccuracies. Two experiments investigated how watching such films influences people's ability to remember associated texts. Subjects watched film clips and studied texts about various historical topics. Whereas the texts contained only correct information, the film clips contained both correct information (consistent with the text) and misinformation (contradicted by the text). Before watching each clip, subjects received a specific warning, a general warning, or no warning about the misinformation. One week later, they returned for a cued-recall test about the texts. Watching a film clip increased correct recall of consistent information relative to recall of the same information when subjects did not see the clip. However, when the information in the film contradicted the text, subjects often (falsely) recalled misinformation from the film. The specific warning substantially reduced this misinformation effect. Teachers should use popular history films with caution and should warn students about major inaccuracies in the films.     

Trauma and memory: effects of post-event misinformation, retrieval order, and retention interval

The present study concerned effects of misinformation, retrieval order, and retention interval on eyewitness memory for a traumatic event (a vivid murder). Relations between misinformation acceptance and compliance were also examined. The classic three-stage misinformation paradigm (Loftus, 1979) was employed, with a multi-component recognition test added. Either immediately or 2 weeks after viewing a distressing film, 232 adults read a narrative (misleading or control) about the murder and then took a recognition test that tapped memory for central and peripheral details. Test-item order either matched the chronology of the film or was randomly determined. Significant misinformation effects were obtained. Moreover, control participants were more accurate in response to questions about central than peripheral information; however, this was not so for misinformed participants. Sequential but not random retrieval order resulted in a higher proportion of correct responses for central as opposed to peripheral misinformation questions. Compliance was significantly related to misinformation effects. Delay increased participants' suggestibility, impaired memory accuracy, and produced higher confidence ratings for misinformed participants compared to controls. Findings indicate that even for a highly negative event, adults' memory is not immune to inaccuracies and suggestive influences.     

Pilgrims sailing the Titanic: Plausibility effects on memory for misinformation

People rely on information they read even when it is inaccurate (Marsh, Meade, & Roediger, Journal of Memory and Language 49:519–536, 2003), but how ubiquitous is this phenomenon? In two experiments, we investigated whether this tendency to encode and rely on inaccuracies from text might be influenced by the plausibility of misinformation. In Experiment 1, we presented stories containing inaccurate plausible statements (e.g., “The Pilgrims’ ship was the Godspeed”), inaccurate implausible statements (e.g., . . . the Titanic), or accurate statements (e.g., . . . the Mayflower). On a subsequent test of general knowledge, participants relied significantly less on implausible than on plausible inaccuracies from the texts but continued to rely on accurate information. In Experiment 2, we replicated these results with the addition of a think-aloud procedure to elicit information about readers’ noticing and evaluative processes for plausible and implausible misinformation. Participants indicated more skepticism and less acceptance of implausible than of plausible inaccuracies. In contrast, they often failed to notice, completely ignored, and at times even explicitly accepted the misinformation provided by plausible lures. These results offer insight into the conditions under which reliance on inaccurate information occurs and suggest potential mechanisms that may underlie reported misinformation effects.     

Who remembers best? Individual differences in memory for events that occurred in a science museum

Individual differences in memory and suggestibility were assessed in an experiment involving 1989 people who attended the Exploratorium, a science museum located in San Francisco. Subjects watched a brief film clip of an assault and later answered questions about it. Approximately half received misinformation about some critical items. Four demographic variables (gender, educational level, age, and occupation) were examined to determine their impact on memory performance. The principle of discrepancy detection predicts that, compared to individuals with a good memory, people who have poor memory to begin with will be relatively suggestible (that is susceptible to misinformation). Some of our findings were consistent with this principle. For example, children (5–10 years) and elderly (over 65) were relatively inaccurate and also relatively suggestible. Other findings were not consistent with the principle, for example the finding that artists and architects were relatively accurate, but they were also highly suggestible.     

Post‐event information presented in a question form eliminates the misinformation effect

This study investigated the influences of sentence surface forms on the misinformation effect. After viewing a film clip, participants received a post‐event narrative describing the events in the film. Critical sentences in the post‐event narrative, presented in either a statement or a question form, contained misinformation instead of questions with embedded false presuppositions; thus participants did not have to answer questions about the original event. During the final cued‐recall test, participants were informed that any relevant information presented in the post‐event narrative was not in the original event and that they should not report it. Consistent with previous findings, Experiment 1 demonstrated that post‐event information presented as an affirmative statement produced the misinformation effect. More importantly, post‐event information presented in a question form, regardless of whether it contained a misleading or studied item, increased the recall of correct information and reduced false recall. Experiment 2 replicated the main finding and ruled out an alternative explanation based on the salience of misleading items. Post‐event information presented in a question form created a condition similar to that which produces the testing effect.     

The effect of question type on resistance to misinformation about present and absent details

The typical misinformation effect shows that accuracy is lower for details about which people received misleading compared to non-misleading (control) information. In two experiments, we examined the misinformation effect for non-witnessed details (i.e., absent). Three question types introduced control, misleading, and absent details (closed, closed-detailed, and open questions) about a mock burglary video. On this misinformation test, participants' reports of absent details were less accurate than control details only when they were introduced using open questions. Misinformation effects in a subsequent recognition test were present for misleading details in both experiments, but for absent details only in Experiment 2. Experiment 2 also revealed that participants who avoided answering open questions containing misleading and absent details had more accurate memories for these details on the subsequent recognition test than participants who answered these questions. In both experiments, confidence was lowest for absent details. Implications for theory and practice are discussed.     

暴力电子游戏的短期脱敏效应：两种接触方式比较

比较主、被动接触暴力电子游戏的脱敏效应,以44名男性大学生为被试,利用生物反馈仪测量被试主动参与游戏或被动观看游戏录像前后,及随后观看暴力视频过程中皮电与心率的变化（脱敏效应的生理指标）。结果表明：（1）暴力电子游戏可以产生脱敏效应。接触游戏15分钟后,暴力游戏组观看暴力视频过程中皮电的增加值明显小于非暴力游戏组;（2）游戏的接触方式对于脱敏效应的程度无显著影响,但主动参与组对于游戏内容知觉到更高的愉快与更低的沮丧     

Mental reinstatement of the misinformation context and the misinformation effect in children and adults

The present study investigated the effects of mental reinstatement of the context in which misleading information about an event was presented on later recognition memory for the event. Five‐year‐olds, 7‐year‐olds and adults were shown a short video depicting a children's adventure and were asked a set of misleading questions to introduce misinformation one week later. Before the recognition memory test was administered another week later, half of the participants were given instructions to mentally reinstate the context of the misleading interview. Memory was assessed with a set of forced‐choice recognition questions once in the misleading interview context and for the children a second time at home one week later. When participants were instructed to mentally reinstate the context of the misleading interview prior to the recognition test, false memory reports occurred more often for adults than for children and had a stronger impact on peripheral information than on central information for both 7‐year‐olds and adults. When 5‐ and 7‐year‐olds were tested at home, false memory reports decreased. Thus, reinstating the context of an interview introducing misinformation can reduce the accuracy of memory reports; the context dependence of both accurate and inaccurate memory reports in children and adults is discussed. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Student's metamemory knowledge about the impact of stereoscopic three‐dimensional presentations of science content

We investigated students' knowledge and beliefs about the impact of using three‐dimensional (3D) multimedia presentations. Students listened to a lecture about the ventricular system, which was presented alone (Experiment 1 only) or with a 3D or a 2D video illustrating the system. Afterwards, students judged how well they would perform on a criterion test. In Experiment 1, students judged that the 3D presentation would be superior to listening to the lecture alone (d = 0.81). Mean judgments were higher for the 3D than 2D presentation (d = 0.24), but this difference was not significant, so we estimated the effect size again. In Experiment 2, judgments were significantly higher after the 3D than 2D presentations (d = 0.40). Test performance was not significantly greater after the 3D than 2D presentations. A survey study again revealed that students believe 3D presentations are superior, and most students reported preferring them to 2D presentations.     

From Eyewitness to Academic Contexts: Examining the Effect of Misinformation in First and Second Languages

The present study adapts the typical eyewitness misinformation paradigm into an academic context. Unbalanced English–Spanish bilinguals (N = 81) listened to a lecture in English (L1) or Spanish (L2), read notes in L1 or L2, and completed a forced‐choice recognition test in the lecture language. Unlike prior studies with proficient bilinguals, unbalanced English‐dominant participants showed greater recognition memory accuracy for material presented in English only than did material presented in Spanish only. English misinformation had a greater impact on memory for the Spanish lecture than vice versa. Most importantly, the modified misinformation paradigm is an effective tool to investigate academic misinformation effects and could be used in bilingual and monolingual research. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

教师课堂教学中的自我表露对学生评价的影响

采用2×3的被试间设计研究课堂教学中教师的自我表露对学生评价的影响.被试分别以视频(录音)形式观看(收听)无表露、表露个人成长经历、表露工作的讲座片断,并对讲座中教师进行评价.结果表明:(1)表露个人经历在视频组和录音组都表现出评价上的优势.(2)热情——冷淡维度,表露工作情况视频比录音评价更高;稳重-轻浮维度,无表露情况视频比录音评价更高.(3)录音组中,高年级对表露和无表露组的评价差距与低年级无显著差异.     

Media influence on attitudes toward suicide.

This experiment investigated the effects of viewing films on suicide and violence on attitudes toward suicide. Non-suicidal university students were assigned to one of three groups: One group was shown a film about suicide, a second saw a film about violence, and the third saw a neutral film. Perceptions of the appropriateness of suicide and level of emotional arousal were measured by a questionnaire administered before and after the films were shown. Both the suicide and violent film groups showed increases in arousal scores after viewing the films. The results suggest that arousal became linked to cognitions specific to film content as a result of viewing the films dealing with suicide and violence. Other findings suggest that, for the suicide and violent film groups, perceived relations with parents were important predictors of film-induced changes in attitudes toward suicide.     

Teaching with symbols tangentially related to topic: using a linked multimedia approach to enhance learning

40 undergraduate students, none of whom were history or literature majors, attended a lecture on Medieval literature. For half the students the lecture was supplemented by two sets of slides. One set summarized course content while the second set contained slides of paintings or other forms of visual art which were only tangentially related to the topic. For the other half of the student-group, the lecture was supplemented by course content slides only. Students viewing symbolic slides had significantly higher test scores on a written 20-question multiple-choice test given immediately after the lecture.     

An analogue study of the effects of Psychological Debriefing on eyewitness memory

Sixty-one participants from the community participated in a randomised controlled trial of group debriefing to assess the effect of this intervention upon memory for a stressful event. Participants were randomly allocated to one of three groups: debriefing; debriefing with an experimenter confederate present (who supplied three pieces of misinformation to the group regarding the stressful event); and a no-treatment control. All groups were shown a very stressful video and were again reviewed after 1 month. Members of the debriefing group where a confederate provided misinformation were more likely to recall this misinformation as fact than members of the other two groups. The debriefing group was also more accurate in their recall of peripheral content than the confederate group. Across all groups, participants were found to be more accurate at central rather than peripheral recall yet more confident for incorrect memories of the video than correct memories.     

The role of commitment in producing misinformation effects in eyewitness memory

We conducted three experiments exploring conditions in which misleading postevent information interferes with people’s ability to remember details about an event they witnessed. The key condition included in each experiment was the misled-plus-commit condition. After viewing slides depicting a crime, subjects in this condition read a narrative that contained misinformation. Following the narrative, they completed an interpolated recognition test that induced them to select the misinformation. Assessment of memory for the slides using a final, modified recognition test indicated that performance in the misled-plus-commit condition was most frequently near chance, whereas performance in the control condition was far above chance. This result was obtained on four separate occasions and indicates that prior retrieval of misinformation impairs memory. Another important finding was that the deleterious effect of passively reading about misinformation in a narrative is not as great as the effect of reading about it and then selecting it on an interpolated test. Actively retrieving misinformation seems to cause particularly deleterious effects. Our conclusion is that the findings are compatible with the retrieval blocking hypothesis, which assumes that repeated retrieval of misinformation blocks access to the witnessed information.     

Reduction of the misinformation effect by arousal induced after learning

Misinformation introduced after events have already occurred causes errors in later retrieval. Based on literature showing that arousal induced after learning enhances delayed retrieval, we investigated whether post-learning arousal can reduce the misinformation effect. 251 participants viewed four short film clips, each followed by a retention test, which for some participants included misinformation. Afterward, participants viewed another film clip that was either arousing or neutral. One week later, the arousal group recognized significantly more veridical details and endorsed significantly fewer misinformation items than the neutral group. The findings suggest that arousal induced after learning reduced source confusion, allowing participants to better retrieve accurate details and to better reject misinformation.