THE EFFECT OF REPEATED LYING ON FALSE MEMORY DEVELOPMENT A dissertation submitted To Kent State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy by Eric J. Rindal August 2017 ©Copyright All rights reserved Except for previously published materials i Dissertation written by Eric James Rindal B.S., Valparaiso University, 2004 M.A., Kent State University, 2015 Ph.D., Kent State University, 2017 Approved by Maria S. Zaragoza, Ph.D___________, Chair, Doctoral Dissertation Committee Katherine A. Rawson, Ph.D_________, Members, Doctoral Dissertation Committee Yossef S. Ben-Porath, Ph.D_________ Bradley J. Morris, Ph.D____________ Ryan L. Claassen, Ph.D.____________ Accepted By Maria S. Zaragoza, Ph.D___________, Chair, Department of Psychological Sciences James L. Blank, Ph.D._____________, Dean, College of Arts and Sciences ii TABLE OF CONTENTS TABLE OF CONTENTS ................................................................................................... iii LIST OF TABLES ...............................................................................................................v LIST OF FIGURES ........................................................................................................... vi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .............................................................................................. vii CHAPTERS I. Introduction ...........................................................................................................1 1.1. Why Might People Come to Develop False Memories for Their Lies? ...............2 1.2. Past Research on the Memorial Consequences of Lying ......................................5 1.3. Preliminary Studies: Can Lying Lead to False Memories? ................................11 1.4. Repeated Lies ......................................................................................................14 1.5. Present Studies ....................................................................................................16 II. Experiment 1 .......................................................................................................20 2.1. Method ................................................................................................................20 2.2. Results .................................................................................................................26 2.3. Discussion ...........................................................................................................32 III. Experiment 2 .......................................................................................................35 3.1. Introduction .........................................................................................................35 3.2. Method ................................................................................................................37 3.3. Results .................................................................................................................39 3.4. Discussion ...........................................................................................................47 IV. Experiment 3 .......................................................................................................52 4.1. Introduction .........................................................................................................52 iii 4.2. Method ................................................................................................................53 4.3. Results .................................................................................................................58 4.4. Discussion ...........................................................................................................65 V. General Discussion .............................................................................................69 5.1. Main Findings .....................................................................................................69 5.2. Mechanisms of False Memory Development: A Source Monitoring Account ..73 5.3. Are These Genuine False Memories? .................................................................76 5.4. Implications of Current Findings for Real World Lies .......................................77 APPENDICES ...................................................................................................................81 A. Lie Manipulation Questionnaire .........................................................................81 B. Recognition of the Witnessed Event Test ...........................................................83 C. Recognition of Prior Responses Test ..................................................................85 D. Additional Analyses ............................................................................................87 E. Experiment 2 Recognition of the Witnessed Event Test ....................................93 F. Memory for Lying Test .......................................................................................96 G. Experiment 3 Recognition of the Witnessed Event Test ....................................99 REFERENCES ................................................................................................................102 iv LIST OF TABLES Table 1. Experiment 1 Lie Manipulation .......................................................................18 Table 2. Mean Confidence in False Assents to Lie Items in Experiment 1 ...................29 Table 3. Joint Proportion of “Yes” or “No” Responses to Witnessing the Lie Items and Providing the Lie Items in Experiment 1 .........................................................31 Table 4. Experiment 2 Lie Manipulation .......................................................................36 Table 5. Mean Confidence in False Assents to Lie Items in Experiment 2 ...................42 Table 6. Joint Proportion of “Yes” or “No” Responses to Witnessing the Lie Items and Providing the Lie Items in Experiment 2 .........................................................45 Table 7. Proportion of Items Participants Accurately Identified Having Lied About in Experiment 2 ....................................................................................................46 Table 8. Mean Proportion of False Assents in Experiment 3 Conditional on Accurate Secondary Task Performance ..........................................................................62 Table 9 Joint Proportion of “Yes” or “No” Responses to Witnessing the Lie Items and Providing the Lie Items in Experiment 3 .........................................................64 Table 10. Mean Confidence in Memory for Providing a Response in Experiment 2 ......88 Table 11. Mean Confidence in Memory for Lying in Experiment 2 ...............................90 Table 12. Mean Confidence in Memory for Providing a Response in Experiment 3 ......91 Table 13. Mean Confidence in Memory for Lying in Experiment 3 ...............................92 v LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1. Design of Preliminary Studies 1 and 2 ............................................................13 Figure 2. Mean Proportion of False Assents in Preliminary Studies 1 and 2..................14 Figure 3. Session 3 Sequence of Memory Measures in Experiments 1, 2, and 3 ...........24 Figure 4. Mean Proportion of False Recall in Experiment 1...........................................27 Figure 5. Mean Proportion of False Assents in Experiment 1 ........................................28 Figure 6. Mean Proportion of False Recall in Experiment 2...........................................40 Figure 7. Mean Proportion of False Assents in Experiment 2 ........................................41 Figure 8. Illustration of Sample Stimuli From the 1-Back Shapes Task .........................56 Figure 9. Mean Proportion of False Recall in Experiment 3...........................................60 Figure 10. Mean Proportion of False Assents in Experiment 3 ........................................61 vi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would not have been able to do this without the support of so many people. I want to thank my wife, Lolitta, for her love and support through this long journey. I also want to thank my parents always loving and supporting me as well as instilling in me a belief in the importance of education. I owe many thanks to all of those at Kent State that had an impact on my time here. Thank you to my advisor and mentor, Maria, for always pushing me to improve in everything I did. I would not be where I am today if you had not taken a chance on me. Many thanks as well to my lab mates, instructors, classmates, and research assistants for the roles they played in this journey. I hope everyone knows how much I truly appreciate them. vii I. Introduction To elicit an accurate account of a crime from an eyewitness, the individual being questioned must be motivated to respond truthfully. Unfortunately, perpetrators, as well as witnesses, are sometimes motivated to lie by willfully generating false information in an attempt to deceive the interviewer (Zuckerman, DePaulo, & Rosenthal, 1981). In a forensic setting, an individual may lie to avoid punishment or to protect others, and these deceptions can have serious consequences (Granhag & Vrij, 2005; Vrij, 2008). It is also the case that suspects are often interviewed on multiple occasions (Fisher, 1995; Kassin et al., 2007) in an effort to elicit the truth. Thus, it is not uncommon for lies to be repeated, rather than