0:00:00.509,0:00:04.841 I'd like to tell you about a legal case that I worked on 0:00:04.841,0:00:08.404 involving a man named Steve Titus. 0:00:08.404,0:00:11.433 Titus was a restaurant manager. 0:00:11.433,0:00:15.523 He was 31 years old, he lived in Seattle, Washington, 0:00:15.523,0:00:17.418 he was engaged to Gretchen, 0:00:17.418,0:00:20.366 about to be married, she was the love of his life. 0:00:20.366,0:00:22.650 And one night, the couple went out 0:00:22.650,0:00:25.655 for a romantic restaurant meal. 0:00:25.655,0:00:27.303 They were on their way home, 0:00:27.303,0:00:30.253 and they were pulled over by a police officer. 0:00:30.253,0:00:33.570 You see, Titus's car sort of resembled 0:00:33.570,0:00:37.457 a car that was driven earlier in the evening 0:00:37.457,0:00:40.863 by a man who raped a female hitchhiker, 0:00:40.863,0:00:44.457 and Titus kind of resembled that rapist. 0:00:44.457,0:00:47.035 So the police took a picture of Titus, 0:00:47.035,0:00:49.802 they put it in a photo lineup, 0:00:49.802,0:00:51.962 they later showed it to the victim, 0:00:51.962,0:00:54.122 and she pointed to Titus's photo. 0:00:54.122,0:00:57.743 She said, "That one's the closest." 0:00:57.743,0:01:01.631 The police and the prosecution proceeded with a trial, 0:01:01.631,0:01:04.972 and when Steve Titus was put on trial for rape, 0:01:04.972,0:01:07.068 the rape victim got on the stand 0:01:07.068,0:01:11.410 and said, "I'm absolutely positive that's the man." 0:01:11.410,0:01:14.336 And Titus was convicted. 0:01:14.336,0:01:16.310 He proclaimed his innocence, 0:01:16.310,0:01:18.892 his family screamed at the jury, 0:01:18.892,0:01:21.763 his fiancée collapsed on the floor sobbing, 0:01:21.763,0:01:25.158 and Titus is taken away to jail. 0:01:25.158,0:01:28.616 So what would you do at this point? 0:01:28.616,0:01:30.252 What would you do? 0:01:30.252,0:01:34.020 Well, Titus lost complete faith in the legal system, 0:01:34.020,0:01:36.052 and yet he got an idea. 0:01:36.052,0:01:38.483 He called up the local newspaper, 0:01:38.483,0:01:41.870 he got the interest of an investigative journalist, 0:01:41.870,0:01:46.606 and that journalist actually found the real rapist, 0:01:46.606,0:01:49.959 a man who ultimately confessed to this rape, 0:01:49.959,0:01:53.251 a man who was thought to have committed 50 rapes 0:01:53.251,0:01:54.583 in that area, 0:01:54.583,0:01:57.757 and when this information was given to the judge, 0:01:57.757,0:02:00.693 the judge set Titus free. 0:02:00.693,0:02:04.724 And really, that's where this case should have ended. 0:02:04.724,0:02:05.847 It should have been over. 0:02:05.847,0:02:08.367 Titus should have thought of this as a horrible year, 0:02:08.367,0:02:12.203 a year of accusation and trial, but over. 0:02:12.203,0:02:14.250 It didn't end that way. 0:02:14.250,0:02:16.928 Titus was so bitter. 0:02:16.928,0:02:19.508 He'd lost his job. He couldn't get it back. 0:02:19.508,0:02:21.351 He lost his fiancée. 0:02:21.351,0:02:24.257 She couldn't put up with his persistent anger. 0:02:24.257,0:02:26.403 He lost his entire savings, 0:02:26.403,0:02:29.261 and so he decided to file a lawsuit 0:02:29.261,0:02:31.542 against the police and others whom he felt 0:02:31.542,0:02:33.861 were responsible for his suffering. 0:02:33.861,0:02:38.574 And that's when I really started working on this case, 0:02:38.574,0:02:40.535 trying to figure out 0:02:40.535,0:02:42.609 how did that victim go from 0:02:42.609,0:02:44.137 "That one's the closest" 0:02:44.137,0:02:48.887 to "I'm absolutely positive that's the guy." 0:02:48.887,0:02:52.166 Well, Titus was consumed with his civil cases. 0:02:52.166,0:02:55.200 He spent every waking moment thinking about it, 0:02:55.200,0:02:59.351 and just days before he was to have his day in court, 0:02:59.351,0:03:01.570 he woke up in the morning, 0:03:01.570,0:03:03.378 doubled over in pain, 0:03:03.378,0:03:06.072 and died of a stress-related heart attack. 0:03:06.072,0:03:09.259 He was 35 years old. 0:03:09.259,0:03:13.936 So I was asked to work on Titus's case 0:03:13.936,0:03:16.584 because I'm a psychological scientist. 0:03:16.584,0:03:20.411 I study memory. I've studied memory for decades. 0:03:20.411,0:03:23.800 And if I meet somebody on an airplane -- 0:03:23.800,0:03:25.896 this happened on the way over to Scotland -- 0:03:25.896,0:03:27.726 if I meet somebody on an airplane, 0:03:27.726,0:03:30.771 and we ask each other, "What do you do? What do you do?" 0:03:30.771,0:03:32.222 and I say "I study memory," 0:03:32.222,0:03:35.602 they usually want to tell me how they have trouble remembering names, 0:03:35.602,0:03:38.401 or they've got a relative who's got Alzheimer's 0:03:38.416,0:03:40.481 or some kind of memory problem, 0:03:40.481,0:03:42.697 but I have to tell them 0:03:42.697,0:03:46.202 I don't study when people forget. 0:03:46.202,0:03:49.204 I study the opposite: when they remember, 0:03:49.204,0:03:51.957 when they remember things that didn't happen 0:03:51.957,0:03:53.922 or remember things that were different 0:03:53.922,0:03:55.947 from the way they really were. 0:03:55.947,0:04:00.683 I study false memories. 0:04:00.683,0:04:04.990 Unhappily, Steve Titus is not the only person 0:04:04.990,0:04:09.295 to be convicted based on somebody's false memory. 0:04:09.295,0:04:12.603 In one project in the United States, 0:04:12.603,0:04:14.855 information has been gathered 0:04:14.855,0:04:18.789 on 300 innocent people, 0:04:18.789,0:04:22.684 300 defendants who were convicted of crimes they didn't do. 0:04:22.684,0:04:27.984 They spent 10, 20, 30 years in prison for these crimes, 0:04:27.984,0:04:30.411 and now DNA testing has proven 0:04:30.411,0:04:33.327 that they are actually innocent. 0:04:33.327,0:04:35.848 And when those cases have been analyzed, 0:04:35.848,0:04:37.989 three quarters of them 0:04:37.989,0:04:43.600 are due to faulty memory, faulty eyewitness memory. 0:04:43.600,0:04:44.863 Well, why? 0:04:44.863,0:04:48.314 Like the jurors who convicted those innocent people 0:04:48.314,0:04:50.598 and the jurors who convicted Titus, 0:04:50.598,0:04:52.839 many people believe that memory 0:04:52.839,0:04:54.486 works like a recording device. 0:04:54.486,0:04:56.743 You just record the information, 0:04:56.743,0:04:59.390 then you call it up and play it back 0:04:59.390,0:05:02.817 when you want to answer questions or identify images. 0:05:02.817,0:05:04.980 But decades of work in psychology 0:05:04.980,0:05:08.133 has shown that this just isn't true. 0:05:08.133,0:05:10.563 Our memories are constructive. 0:05:10.563,0:05:12.132 They're reconstructive. 0:05:12.132,0:05:15.613 Memory works a little bit more like a Wikipedia page: 0:05:15.613,0:05:20.726 You can go in there and change it, but so can other people. 0:05:20.726,0:05:25.975 I first started studying this constructive memory process 0:05:25.975,0:05:28.390 in the 1970s. 0:05:28.390,0:05:32.813 I did my experiments that involved showing people 0:05:32.813,0:05:35.318 simulated crimes and accidents 0:05:35.318,0:05:38.836 and asking them questions about what they remember. 0:05:38.836,0:05:42.775 In one study, we showed people a simulated accident 0:05:42.775,0:05:44.053 and we asked people, 0:05:44.053,0:05:46.917 how fast were the cars going when they hit each other? 0:05:46.917,0:05:48.551 And we asked other people, 0:05:48.551,0:05:52.240 how fast were the cars going when they smashed into each other? 0:05:52.240,0:05:55.242 And if we asked the leading "smashed" question, 0:05:55.242,0:05:58.527 the witnesses told us the cars were going faster, 0:05:58.527,0:06:02.524 and moreover, that leading "smashed" question 0:06:02.524,0:06:05.384 caused people to be more likely to tell us 0:06:05.384,0:06:08.451 that they saw broken glass in the accident scene 0:06:08.451,0:06:12.230 when there wasn't any broken glass at all. 0:06:12.230,0:06:15.119 In another study, we showed a simulated accident 0:06:15.119,0:06:18.779 where a car went through an intersection with a stop sign, 0:06:18.779,0:06:23.711 and if we asked a question that insinuated it was a yield sign, 0:06:23.711,0:06:27.560 many witnesses told us they remember seeing a yield sign 0:06:27.560,0:06:31.017 at the intersection, not a stop sign. 0:06:31.017,0:06:33.206 And you might be thinking, well, you know, 0:06:33.206,0:06:34.529 these are filmed events, 0:06:34.529,0:06:36.457 they are not particularly stressful. 0:06:36.457,0:06:39.191 Would the same kind of mistakes be made 0:06:39.191,0:06:42.142 with a really stressful event? 0:06:42.142,0:06:45.233 In a study we published just a few months ago, 0:06:45.233,0:06:47.537 we have an answer to this question, 0:06:47.537,0:06:50.301 because what was unusual about this study 0:06:50.301,0:06:55.933 is we arranged for people to have a very stressful experience. 0:06:55.933,0:06:58.162 The subjects in this study 0:06:58.162,0:07:00.672 were members of the U.S. military 0:07:00.672,0:07:05.097 who were undergoing a harrowing training exercise 0:07:05.097,0:07:07.879 to teach them what it's going to be like for them 0:07:07.879,0:07:11.797 if they are ever captured as prisoners of war. 0:07:11.797,0:07:14.227 And as part of this training exercise, 0:07:14.227,0:07:17.756 these soldiers are interrogated in an aggressive, 0:07:17.756,0:07:22.842 hostile, physically abusive fashion for 30 minutes 0:07:22.842,0:07:25.659 and later on they have to try to identify 0:07:25.659,0:07:28.682 the person who conducted that interrogation. 0:07:28.682,0:07:32.505 And when we feed them suggestive information 0:07:32.505,0:07:35.283 that insinuates it's a different person, 0:07:35.283,0:07:39.320 many of them misidentify their interrogator, 0:07:39.320,0:07:43.155 often identifying someone who doesn't even remotely 0:07:43.155,0:07:46.259 resemble the real interrogator. 0:07:46.259,0:07:48.560 And so what these studies are showing 0:07:48.560,0:07:52.420 is that when you feed people misinformation 0:07:52.420,0:07:55.800 about some experience that they may have had, 0:07:55.800,0:08:01.455 you can distort or contaminate or change their memory. 0:08:01.455,0:08:03.655 Well out there in the real world, 0:08:03.655,0:08:06.546 misinformation is everywhere. 0:08:06.546,0:08:07.906 We get misinformation 0:08:07.906,0:08:10.822 not only if we're questioned in a leading way, 0:08:10.822,0:08:13.269 but if we talk to other witnesses 0:08:13.269,0:08:16.302 who might consciously or inadvertently feed us 0:08:16.302,0:08:18.439 some erroneous information, 0:08:18.439,0:08:23.169 or if we see media coverage about some event we might have experienced, 0:08:23.169,0:08:25.962 all of these provide the opportunity 0:08:25.962,0:08:30.312 for this kind of contamination of our memory. 0:08:30.312,0:08:34.100 In the 1990s, we began to see 0:08:34.100,0:08:38.783 an even more extreme kind of memory problem. 0:08:38.783,0:08:41.879 Some patients were going into therapy with one problem -- 0:08:41.879,0:08:44.793 maybe they had depression, an eating disorder -- 0:08:44.793,0:08:47.546 and they were coming out of therapy 0:08:47.546,0:08:50.207 with a different problem. 0:08:50.207,0:08:53.908 Extreme memories for horrific brutalizations, 0:08:53.908,0:08:55.891 sometimes in satanic rituals, 0:08:55.891,0:09:00.588 sometimes involving really bizarre and unusual elements. 0:09:00.588,0:09:03.142 One woman came out of psychotherapy 0:09:03.142,0:09:05.570 believing that she'd endured years 0:09:05.570,0:09:09.472 of ritualistic abuse, where she was forced into a pregnancy 0:09:09.472,0:09:12.038 and that the baby was cut from her belly. 0:09:12.038,0:09:14.397 But there were no physical scars 0:09:14.397,0:09:16.423 or any kind of physical evidence 0:09:16.423,0:09:19.304 that could have supported her story. 0:09:19.304,0:09:22.312 And when I began looking into these cases, 0:09:22.312,0:09:23.762 I was wondering, 0:09:23.762,0:09:26.090 where do these bizarre memories come from? 0:09:26.090,0:09:30.477 And what I found is that most of these situations 0:09:30.477,0:09:35.968 involved some particular form of psychotherapy. 0:09:35.968,0:09:37.567 And so I asked, 0:09:37.567,0:09:40.955 were some of the things going on in this psychotherapy -- 0:09:40.955,0:09:43.839 like the imagination exercises 0:09:43.839,0:09:45.896 or dream interpretation, 0:09:45.896,0:09:48.028 or in some cases hypnosis, 0:09:48.028,0:09:51.846 or in some cases exposure to false information -- 0:09:51.846,0:09:54.633 were these leading these patients 0:09:54.633,0:09:57.310 to develop these very bizarre, 0:09:57.310,0:10:00.241 unlikely memories? 0:10:00.241,0:10:02.400 And I designed some experiments 0:10:02.400,0:10:07.425 to try to study the processes that were being used 0:10:07.425,0:10:10.498 in this psychotherapy so I could study 0:10:10.498,0:10:14.049 the development of these very rich false memories. 0:10:14.049,0:10:16.457 In one of the first studies we did, 0:10:16.457,0:10:18.810 we used suggestion, 0:10:18.810,0:10:22.873 a method inspired by the psychotherapy we saw in these cases, 0:10:22.873,0:10:24.983 we used this kind of suggestion 0:10:24.983,0:10:26.835 and planted a false memory 0:10:26.835,0:10:29.912 that when you were a kid, five or six years old, 0:10:29.912,0:10:32.163 you were lost in a shopping mall. 0:10:32.163,0:10:34.663 You were frightened. You were crying. 0:10:34.663,0:10:37.177 You were ultimately rescued by an elderly person 0:10:37.177,0:10:39.029 and reunited with the family. 0:10:39.029,0:10:41.637 And we succeeded in planting this memory 0:10:41.637,0:10:45.743 in the minds of about a quarter of our subjects. 0:10:45.743,0:10:47.748 And you might be thinking, well, 0:10:47.748,0:10:50.094 that's not particularly stressful. 0:10:50.094,0:10:53.463 But we and other investigators have planted 0:10:53.463,0:10:56.221 rich false memories of things that were 0:10:56.221,0:10:59.136 much more unusual and much more stressful. 0:10:59.136,0:11:01.675 So in a study done in Tennessee, 0:11:01.675,0:11:04.091 researchers planted the false memory 0:11:04.091,0:11:06.665 that when you were a kid, you nearly drowned 0:11:06.665,0:11:09.172 and had to be rescued by a life guard. 0:11:09.172,0:11:11.475 And in a study done in Canada, 0:11:11.475,0:11:13.999 researchers planted the false memory 0:11:13.999,0:11:15.227 that when you were a kid, 0:11:15.227,0:11:18.957 something as awful as being attacked by a vicious animal 0:11:18.957,0:11:20.339 happened to you, 0:11:20.339,0:11:23.761 succeeding with about half of their subjects. 0:11:23.761,0:11:26.113 And in a study done in Italy, 0:11:26.113,0:11:28.771 researchers planted the false memory, 0:11:28.771,0:11:33.983 when you were a kid, you witnessed demonic possession. 0:11:33.983,0:11:36.190 I do want to add that it might seem 0:11:36.190,0:11:39.929 like we are traumatizing these experimental subjects 0:11:39.929,0:11:41.529 in the name of science, 0:11:41.529,0:11:46.167 but our studies have gone through thorough evaluation 0:11:46.167,0:11:48.142 by research ethics boards 0:11:48.142,0:11:50.484 that have made the decision 0:11:50.484,0:11:53.557 that the temporary discomfort that some 0:11:53.557,0:11:56.641 of these subjects might experience in these studies 0:11:56.641,0:12:00.541 is outweighed by the importance of this problem 0:12:00.541,0:12:03.648 for understanding memory processes 0:12:03.648,0:12:06.994 and the abuse of memory that is going on 0:12:06.994,0:12:10.287 in some places in the world. 0:12:10.287,0:12:13.325 Well, to my surprise, 0:12:13.325,0:12:16.754 when I published this work and began to speak out 0:12:16.754,0:12:20.649 against this particular brand of psychotherapy, 0:12:20.649,0:12:24.629 it created some pretty bad problems for me: 0:12:24.629,0:12:29.530 hostilities, primarily from the repressed memory therapists, 0:12:29.530,0:12:31.206 who felt under attack, 0:12:31.206,0:12:34.734 and by the patients whom they had influenced. 0:12:34.734,0:12:37.671 I had sometimes armed guards at speeches 0:12:37.671,0:12:39.576 that I was invited to give, 0:12:39.576,0:12:43.793 people trying to drum up letter-writing campaigns to get me fired. 0:12:43.793,0:12:45.774 But probably the worst 0:12:45.774,0:12:48.541 was I suspected that a woman 0:12:48.541,0:12:50.965 was innocent of abuse 0:12:50.965,0:12:53.801 that was being claimed by her grown daughter. 0:12:53.801,0:12:57.218 She accused her mother of sexual abuse 0:12:57.218,0:12:59.077 based on a repressed memory. 0:12:59.077,0:13:01.960 And this accusing daughter had actually allowed her story 0:13:01.960,0:13:05.394 to be filmed and presented in public places. 0:13:05.394,0:13:07.903 I was suspicious of this story, 0:13:07.903,0:13:10.203 and so I started to investigate, 0:13:10.203,0:13:14.686 and eventually found information that convinced me 0:13:14.686,0:13:16.975 that this mother was innocent. 0:13:16.975,0:13:19.936 I published an exposé on the case, 0:13:19.936,0:13:23.380 and a little while later, the accusing daughter 0:13:23.380,0:13:24.901 filed a lawsuit. 0:13:24.901,0:13:27.256 Even though I'd never mentioned her name, 0:13:27.256,0:13:31.618 she sued me for defamation and invasion of privacy. 0:13:31.618,0:13:34.341 And I went through nearly five years 0:13:34.341,0:13:40.893 of dealing with this messy, unpleasant litigation, 0:13:40.893,0:13:44.567 but finally, finally, it was over and I could really 0:13:44.567,0:13:46.991 get back to my work. 0:13:46.991,0:13:49.476 In the process, however, I became part 0:13:49.476,0:13:52.130 of a disturbing trend in America 0:13:52.130,0:13:54.237 where scientists are being sued 0:13:54.237,0:13:58.836 for simply speaking out on matters of great public controversy. 0:13:58.836,0:14:02.194 When I got back to my work, I asked this question: 0:14:02.194,0:14:04.592 if I plant a false memory in your mind, 0:14:04.592,0:14:06.436 does it have repercussions? 0:14:06.436,0:14:08.395 Does it affect your later thoughts, 0:14:08.395,0:14:10.496 your later behaviors? 0:14:10.496,0:14:12.523 Our first study planted a false memory 0:14:12.523,0:14:15.849 that you got sick as a child eating certain foods: 0:14:15.849,0:14:18.848 hard-boiled eggs, dill pickles, strawberry ice cream. 0:14:18.848,0:14:22.038 And we found that once we planted this false memory, 0:14:22.038,0:14:24.489 people didn't want to eat the foods as much 0:14:24.489,0:14:26.749 at an outdoor picnic. 0:14:26.749,0:14:30.622 The false memories aren't necessarily bad or unpleasant. 0:14:30.622,0:14:32.980 If we planted a warm, fuzzy memory 0:14:32.980,0:14:36.001 involving a healthy food like asparagus, 0:14:36.001,0:14:39.476 we could get people to want to eat asparagus more. 0:14:39.476,0:14:41.850 And so what these studies are showing 0:14:41.850,0:14:43.965 is that you can plant false memories 0:14:43.965,0:14:45.378 and they have repercussions 0:14:45.378,0:14:50.463 that affect behavior long after the memories take hold. 0:14:50.463,0:14:52.887 Well, along with this ability 0:14:52.887,0:14:55.810 to plant memories and control behavior 0:14:55.810,0:14:59.991 obviously come some important ethical issues, 0:14:59.991,0:15:03.050 like, when should we use this mind technology? 0:15:03.050,0:15:06.730 And should we ever ban its use? 0:15:06.730,0:15:09.513 Therapists can't ethically plant false memories 0:15:09.513,0:15:11.100 in the mind of their patients 0:15:11.100,0:15:13.664 even if it would help the patient, 0:15:13.664,0:15:15.286 but there's nothing to stop a parent 0:15:15.286,0:15:19.735 from trying this out on their overweight or obese teenager. 0:15:19.735,0:15:22.340 And when I suggested this publicly, 0:15:22.340,0:15:25.686 it created an outcry again. 0:15:25.686,0:15:29.719 "There she goes. She's advocating that parents lie to their children." 0:15:29.719,0:15:31.964 Hello, Santa Claus. (Laughter) 0:15:31.964,0:15:41.461 I mean, another way to think about this is, 0:15:41.461,0:15:43.494 which would you rather have, 0:15:43.494,0:15:46.523 a kid with obesity, diabetes, shortened lifespan, 0:15:46.523,0:15:48.055 all the things that go with it, 0:15:48.055,0:15:51.071 or a kid with one little extra bit of false memory? 0:15:51.071,0:15:54.462 I know what I would choose for a kid of mine. 0:15:54.462,0:15:58.439 But maybe my work has made me different from most people. 0:15:58.439,0:16:00.518 Most people cherish their memories, 0:16:00.518,0:16:02.672 know that they represent their identity, 0:16:02.672,0:16:04.697 who they are, where they came from. 0:16:04.697,0:16:07.555 And I appreciate that. I feel that way too. 0:16:07.555,0:16:09.760 But I know from my work 0:16:09.760,0:16:14.241 how much fiction is already in there. 0:16:14.241,0:16:16.973 If I've learned anything from these decades 0:16:16.973,0:16:19.383 of working on these problems, it's this: 0:16:19.383,0:16:21.594 just because somebody tells you something 0:16:21.594,0:16:23.169 and they say it with confidence, 0:16:23.169,0:16:25.849 just because they say it with lots of detail, 0:16:25.849,0:16:28.608 just because they express emotion when they say it, 0:16:28.608,0:16:31.810 it doesn't mean that it really happened. 0:16:31.810,0:16:35.675 We can't reliably distinguish true memories from false memories. 0:16:35.675,0:16:39.223 We need independent corroboration. 0:16:39.223,0:16:42.313 Such a discovery has made me more tolerant 0:16:42.313,0:16:44.452 of the everyday memory mistakes 0:16:44.452,0:16:47.366 that my friends and family members make. 0:16:47.366,0:16:51.900 Such a discovery might have saved Steve Titus, 0:16:51.900,0:16:55.476 the man whose whole future was snatched away 0:16:55.476,0:16:57.714 by a false memory. 0:16:57.714,0:17:00.530 But meanwhile, we should all keep in mind, 0:17:00.530,0:17:02.166 we'd do well to, 0:17:02.166,0:17:06.037 that memory, like liberty, 0:17:06.037,0:17:09.731 is a fragile thing. 0:17:09.731,0:17:12.669 Thank you. Thank you. 0:17:12.669,0:17:15.397 Thank you. (Applause) 0:17:15.397,0:17:19.116 Thanks very much. (Applause)