False procedural memory

ABSTRACT

Lately, it seems a number of philosophical memory theories are incorporating false memory phenomena into their conceptual frameworks. At the same time, scientific research is extending its analysis of false memories to nondeclarative forms of memory. However, both sides have paid little attention to the notion of false procedural memory. Yet, from everyday experience as well as from psychological investigation, we are aware of different ways procedural memory goes wrong. Here, I characterize the conceptual foundation of false procedural memory. First, I distinguish remembering-how from knowing-how by proposing that remembering-how requires the performance of an act. Accordingly, genuine remembering-how is characterized as the performance of an act for which a respective ability has been acquired that is instrumental in the execution of said act. False remembering-how is identified as a kind of error where a subject acquires the ability to perform a certain act, which is then correctly executed, but is not what the subject tried to perform. This framework of false procedural memory is delineated from notions of interference and crosstalk. A comparison with current philosophical theories of false memory and analysis showing the relevance for current psychological research and everyday life concludes the paper.

KEYWORDS:

• False Memory
• procedural Memory
• habit Memory
• knowing-how
• interference

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. Recently, serious objections have been voiced against this definition, which, leaving aside specific differences between confabulations and false memories, state that (mnestic) confabulations can also be veridical (Bernecker, 2017; Michaelian, 2016).

2. In this paper, I mostly adhere to the common taxonomy of memory proposed by Larry Squire (2004) as a guideline, but the exact taxonomic relations do not play a substantive role here. In this taxonomy, nondeclarative memory encompasses procedural memory, priming and perceptual learning, learned responses through conditioning (associative learning), and changed response strength to a stimulus after exposure to that stimulus (nonassociative learning).

3. The ways the term ‘(procedural) memory’ (and also ‘remembering’) is used are generally inconsistent across the literature. It is sometimes used to denote a system, a mental state, a form of knowledge, a change of behavior, or a change of internal representations, among other uses. For discussions related to the different uses of memory and remembering, see Werning and Cheng (2017), and Roediger et al. (2007) for the uses in science more generally. Similar inconsistencies can be found related to the terms ‘know(ing)-how’ and ‘remember(ing)-how’ as well, which is why relevant differences between them are elaborated later in the paper.

4. I use the terms knowing-how and remembering-how in the hyphenated form to refer to cases captured by the terms ‘procedural memory’ or ‘habit memory.’ Sometimes ‘knowing how’ or ‘remembering how’ are used in a different sense (such as saying that someone today knows how Caesar died), which is not the main concern here. Similarly, procedural memory is sometimes expressed through the use of words other than ‘knowing’ or ‘remembering’ (such as saying that someone can play the piano well; though context is quite important here).

5. I will disregard the distinction sometimes made in psychological research between errors, mistakes, slips, and lapses as it is too comprehensive to be considered here (cf. Reason, 1990 for an overview).

6. This particular example (i.e., doing a front flip when trying to do a backflip) might seem highly unlikely in isolation, but it could very well occur in a more complex dance routine.

7. This is not to say that someone with a vast knowledge of human physiology cannot know how white blood cells are produced in human bodies and use this knowledge in a way that leads to an increase in the amount of white blood cells in their body (through training at certain altitudes or medication).

8. Depending on the view, some make a distinction between false memories and mnestic confabulations. Bernecker (2017), for example, characterizes confabulation as a kind of error “that occurs when patients produce stories that fill in gaps in their memories” (p. 1). If these confabulations are due to failure of a memory system, they are said to be mnestic (Schnider, 2018) or mnemonic (Bernecker, 2017) (terms used synonymously). According to this view, a mnestic confabulation is a false memory if what is being confabulated is false. For a more in-depth discussion about types of confabulation from a psychological perspective see Schnider (2018).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft [DFG - GSC 82].

Notes on contributors

Urim Retkoceri

Urim Retkoceri first worked on bioimaging, anthropology and neurobiology at the LMU in Munich before switching to neurophilosophy in general, and the philosophy of memory in particular.