Adaptive constructive processes and memory accuracy: Consequences of counterfactual simulations in young and older adults

Abstract

People frequently engage in counterfactual thinking: mental simulations of alternative outcomes to past events. Like simulations of future events, counterfactual simulations serve adaptive functions. However, future simulation can also result in various kinds of distortions and has thus been characterised as an adaptive constructive process. Here we approach counterfactual thinking as such and examine whether it can distort memory for actual events. In Experiments 1a/b young and older adults imagined themselves experiencing different scenarios. Participants then imagined the same scenario again, engaged in no further simulation of a scenario, or imagined a counterfactual outcome. On a subsequent recognition test participants were more likely to make false alarms to counterfactual lures than novel scenarios. Older adults were more prone to these memory errors than younger adults. In Experiment 2 younger and older participants selected and performed different actions, then recalled performing some of those actions, imagined performing alternative actions to some of the selected actions, and did not imagine others. Participants, especially older adults, were more likely to falsely remember counterfactual actions than novel actions as previously performed. The findings suggest that counterfactual thinking can cause source confusion based on internally generated misinformation, consistent with its characterisation as an adaptive constructive process.

Keywords:

• Counterfactual thinking
• Adaptive processes
• Episodic memory
• False memory
• Misinformation
• Ageing

The authors thank Nathalie Aharon, Miguel Cutiongco, Kai Fei, Whitney Fitts, Yiyi Liu, and David Orama for their help with data collection and analysis. We are also very grateful to Jon Chamberlain for recording scenarios for Experiment 1.

The authors thank Nathalie Aharon, Miguel Cutiongco, Kai Fei, Whitney Fitts, Yiyi Liu, and David Orama for their help with data collection and analysis. We are also very grateful to Jon Chamberlain for recording scenarios for Experiment 1.

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported by grant AG08441 from the National Institute of Aging awarded to Daniel L. Schacter.