Azriel Grysman

The time travelling self: comparing self and other in narratives of past and future events.

Mental time travel research emphasizes the connection between past and future thinking, whereas autobiographical memory research emphasizes the interrelationship of self and memory. This study explored the relationship between self and memory when thinking about both past and future events. Participants reported events from the near and distant past and future, for themselves, a close friend, or an acquaintance. Past events were rated higher in phenomenological quality than future events, and near self events were rated higher in quality than those about friends. Although future events were more positive than past events, only valence ratings for self and close friend showed a linear increase in positivity from distant past to future. Content analysis showed that this increase in positivity could not be ascribed to choosing events from the cultural life script. These findings provide evidence for the role of personal goals in imagining the future.

Self-enhancement and the life script in future thinking across the lifespan

Studies comparing memory and future event simulation find that future events are more positive, and more often depend on life script events (e.g., culturally normative landmark events) than past events. Previous research does not address the link between this positivity bias and the life stage of college-age participants or their reliance on these scripted events. To examine this positivity bias, narratives of past and anticipated future events were elicited from participants aged 18–74 years, and were examined for reliance on the life script and valence ratings. Results showed that, across age groups, future events were rated as more positive than past events, and that life script events were common in the distant future. Notably, whereas younger adult age groups wrote primarily about their own life script events, older participants more commonly wrote about attending the life script events of significant others, such as children and grandchildren. These findings suggest that simulated future events play a valuable role in self-enhancement across the lifespan. Furthermore, the life script can be viewed as a useful search mechanism when one is missing the episodic details that are more available in memories; however, it is not the source of positivity bias for future events.

Emotion, gender, and gender typical identity in autobiographical memory.

ABSTRACT Gender differences in the emotional intensity and content of autobiographical memory (AM) are inconsistent across studies, and may be influenced as much by gender identity as by categorical gender. To explore this question, data were collected from 196 participants (age 18–40), split evenly between men and women. Participants narrated four memories, a neutral event, high point event, low point event, and self-defining memory, completed ratings of emotional intensity for each event, and completed four measures of gender typical identity. For self-reported emotional intensity, gender differences in AM were mediated by identification with stereotypical feminine gender norms. For narrative use of affect terms, both gender and gender typical identity predicted affective expression. The results confirm contextual models of gender identity (e.g., Diamond, 2012. The desire disorder in research on sexual orientation in women: Contributions of dynamical systems theory. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 41, 73–83) and underscore the dynamic interplay between gender and gender identity in the emotional expression of autobiographical memories.

Gender, experimenter gender and medium of report influence the content of autobiographical memory report

ABSTRACT In this study, we examined the role of context in autobiographical memory narratives, specifically as it pertains to gender among emerging adults. Male and female participants reported stressful events in their lives in the presence of an experimenter, and were randomly assigned either to report events verbally or type them, and to report in the presence of a male or female experimenter. Narratives were coded for factual and interpretive content. Results revealed that men verbally reporting to women reported longer narratives than all other groups. Womens narrative length did not vary by medium of report or conversational partner, but women used proportionally fewer internal state phrases when verbally reporting to men than when reporting to women. Women also used proportionally fewer evaluative statements in verbal reports than in typed narratives. Of these important interactions among context, gender, and experimenter gender, some findings, such as mens longer narratives and womens reduced internal states, were counter to expectations. These findings highlight the importance of methodological influences in autobiographical memory studies, in regard to both the context generated by experimental methods, and how gender differences are understood.

The self in autobiographical memory: Effects of self-salience on narrative content and structure

Contemporary models of autobiographical memory attribute a prominent role to the conceptualisation of the self. In an attempt to better understand the impact of the self as an organising feature of autobiographical memory, narratives of personal episodes were elicited, either after a questionnaire about the self (self-prime condition) or after a distractor task (control condition). Participants also wrote a narrative of a turning-point memory, which is by definition a self-focused narrative. Narratives were divided into propositions and analysed for the types of statements used. As predicted, when writing self-focused turning-point narratives participants included more statements relating to the meaning of an event and connecting it to the self, and fewer statements focusing on the who, what, where, and when of the narrative. Narratives written after the self-prime also demonstrated characteristics that were similar to turning-point narratives, although not on all measures. This shift in narrative focus in turning-point and self-primed memory narratives indicates an increased attempt to fulfil goals of coherence rather than correspondence (Conway, 2005). These findings lend insight into the nature of the relationship between the semantic conceptualisation of the self, and the process of retrieving event-specific knowledge in episodic memory.

The roles of gender and temporal distance in the recall of dissonant self-related memories

This study examined strategies employed to support a positive self-image in the face of dissonant self-related memories, especially focusing on the role of gender. Participants (N=498) were recruited online and identified a self-descriptive trait. They then reported a memory of a time when they did or did not act according to that trait. Participants distanced themselves from dissonant, self-related memories by downplaying the events importance and relevance to identity and by emphasizing their lack of agency and the degree to which they had changed. Additionally, participants reported dissonant events from further in the past than consonant events, a tendency displayed more strongly amongst women than men. Women also rated events as more pertinent to the self on questionnaire measures. Findings demonstrate ways that autobiographical memories are reported and organized to support a positive self-image, and deepen an understanding of the role of gender in this process.

Gender and gender typicality in autobiographical memory: A replication and extension

ABSTRACT Gender differences in autobiographical memory (AM) are commonly reported, but often inconsistent across studies using varied measurement techniques. The current study aimed to provide more clarity to where and why gender differences emerge by carefully controlling for factors hypothesised to be relevant to gender; thus, it tested shorter and longer term AM using both narrative and questionnaire measures, and further tested whether subscription to feminine-typical traits mediated these differences. Results demonstrate that women’s memory narratives score higher than men’s on measures of affect, connection to others, factual and interpretive elaboration, and thematic coherence. Women scoring high on feminine-typical traits demonstrated larger differences when compared to men scoring low on these measures than did average men and women, but these latter groups still differed substantially. Gender differences were present in narrative measures of longer term events (often more than two years) and shorter term events (one day–one week), but effect sizes were larger in longer term events. Gender differences were not common on questionnaire measures. These findings replicate previous narrative-based gender differences and highlight the need for carefully constructed studies of socio-cultural, individual, and developmental influences.

Agency Detection in God Concepts: Essential, Situational, and Individual Factors

AbstractWe investigate how current models of the conceptual representation of God as highly agentive have consequences for how the God concept is processed in memory for stories when God is not presented as specifically agentive. Participants read stories describing a person experiencing a potentially harmful situation, avoiding the harm, and then thanking either God or luck. Results indicate significant differences between recall of the God and luck stories: God was recalled more often, recalled with intentional language, and God stories were recalled with more intrusions than luck stories. However, results indicate no differences between God and luck story recall on a subsequent recognition task. Participants’ religious identity correlated with both recall and recognition scores. Findings are taken as evidence of a God concept that is represented as highly agentive, and differences between the recognition and recall task reflect differences between intuitive and explicit theology. Results further our knowledge about the way conceptual representation of the supernatural can influence text processing, and suggest ways in which the perception of agency can be influenced.

Gendered Autobiographical Memory: Feminist Approaches to Theory and Method

Sense of self and autobiographical memory are inextricably intertwined. In this chapter, we use a feminist lens to review the literature on autobiographical memory focusing on gender as conceptualized and assessed in three simultaneously embedded contexts, the local context, the developmental context, and the cultural context. A personal narrative that is produced within a specific social interaction is influenced by that local context, as well as the developmental history of the individual as embedded within a sociocultural context that frames the structure and interpretation of individual lives. Importantly, in discussing the local context, we underscore the research interaction itself as a context and provide a critical analysis of methods used to study autobiographical memory. After explicating the local, developmental, and cultural contexts, we present three data sets that illustrate how any given autobiographical narrative is simultaneously influenced by the local, developmental, and cultural context in which it is expressed. We end the chapter with a final note about how our approach provides a new way to understand both stability and change in autobiography and narrative identity over time.

Later adults’ cultural life scripts of middle and later adulthood

ABSTRACT The cultural life script (CLS) refers to expected prototypical life events, often including life transitions overwhelmingly occurring at ages 11-30. This study outlined CLS events at ages after the majority of these events typically occur. Participants, age 38-76, nominated events they expected a person of their age to experience in the future. Participants rated each event’s valence, importance, prevalence, and expected age of occurrence. Events were coded into three categories: the normative CLS for events listed by previous CLS studies, offspring’s CLS for experiencing CLS events of offspring, and later adulthood CLS for other events nominated by at least 4% of participants. Results suggest scripted events highlighting positivity and change. Offspring’s CLS was more positive and occurred earlier than others. Correlations emerged between event characteristics and well-being. Results affirm the prominence of transitions in memory, and suggest ways that older adults maintain well-being despite a cultural narrative that emphasizes decline.