Depressive Symptoms and Negatively-biased False Memories: Does Dysphoria Lead to Schema-consistent False Memories?

Clinical and memory research has shown thatdepressive symptoms may lead to a negative bias inmemory recall. This bias results indisproportionately recalling negative memories andevents, which may perpetuate and support depressivesymptomatology. The current books experimentallyinvestigates if these biases extend to dysphoric individuals'' recall, potentially resulting innegatively biased false memories (i. e., recallingdetails or events that have never in fact occurred). The implications for clinical practice, as well as eyewitness testimony are explored. Book contents include a review of memory biasresearch, suggestibility and clinical psychologicalvariables that may increase propensity for producingfalse memories. Study design, results and discussionfollow. This book will appeal to mental health cliniciansworking in the area of mood and depression, professionals in the legal area dealing with memoryaccuracy and academics in the areas of clinicalpsychology, memory and individual differences.