The role of personal biases in the explanation of confabulation

Abstract

Introduction. Previous research has demonstrated that motivational forces play an important role in determining the content of confabulation. In particular the content of confabulation has been shown to contain a positive emotional bias. This study investigated the role of personal biases in the confabulations of six patients with diverse aetiologies.

Method. Confabulations were elicited with a series of structured interviews. We then compared the patients’ confabulations to their actual situations. Further analyses compared confabulations about current (i.e., the postmorbid period) and past (i.e., premorbid events and general life circumstances) events.

Results. Group analysis confirmed a general bias to recall events that were more positive than the reality. However, examination of individual cases revealed that positive biases were not universal. Confabulations about current circumstances showed the positive bias, whereas an emotional bias was not evident in past confabulations.

Conclusion. We conclude that motivational forces play a role in determining the content of confabulations but conceive of this role primarily in terms of a need to maintain a consistent self-concept (whether positive or negative) overlaid upon the ease with which an individual can retrieve familiar premorbid daily activities and routines.

Keywords:

• Autobiographical memory
• Confabulation
• Delusions

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank the patients and families for their participation in this project. We would also like to thank Kate Martin and Thea Hamieh, Clinical Neuropsychologists at the Royal Rehabilitation Centre, Sydney, who were responsible for recruitment and advice concerning the patients. Thanks also to Dr. Kristina Prelog for reviewing patient brain scans and Dr. Aikaterini Fotopoulou for her helpful comments on an earlier draft on this manuscript.