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memory
Your memory stores only the gist of experiences.
Leveling and sharpening causes you to omit details while exaggerating specific core elements when recalling a story or event.
As time passes, your memory naturally simplifies complex accounts by removing minor details (leveling) and making prominent features more distinct (sharpening). You are not a camera recording reality, but an editor constantly rewriting your personal history to fit a coherent narrative. The resulting memory is a simplified construct, not an accurate reproduction.
You remember the meaning, not the event.
Where this comes from
- Study
- Allport and Postman, 1947
- What the check found
- The attribution is correct in the context of rumor theory, though the concepts originated earlier with Bartlett. The definition provided is accurate.
- Confidence
- Solid, with limits
Related
One of these every day, and every one names the study it came from. When a finding is contested, it says so.