Effect of delay of first interview and repetition of interview on accuracy and confidence of recall of a flashbulb -type memory

Hearing of the news of the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, in a traffic accident, is taken as an analogue for being a percipient but uninvolved witness to a crime, or a witness to another person's sudden confession to some illegal act. This event (known in the literature as a “reception event”) has previously been hypothesized to cause one to form a special type of memory commonly known as a “flashbulb memory” (FB) (Brown and Kulik, 1977). FB's are hypothesized to be especially resilient against forgetting, highly detailed including peripheral details, clear, and inspiring great confidence in the individual for their accuracy. FB's are dependent for their formation upon surprise, emotional valence, and impact, or consequentiality to the witness of the initiating event. FB's are thought to be enhanced by frequent rehearsal. FB's are very important in the context of criminal investigation and litigation in that investigators and jurors usually place great store in witnesses, regardless of their actual accuracy, who claim to have a clear and complete recollection of an event, and who express this confidently. Therefore, the lives, or at least the freedom, of criminal defendants, and the fortunes of civil litigants hang on the testimony of witnesses professing to have FB's. ^ In this study, which includes a large and diverse sample (N = 305), participants were surveyed within 2–4 days after hearing of the fatal accident, and again at intervals of 2 and 4 weeks, 6, 12, and 18 months. Contrary to the FB hypothesis, I found that participants' FB's degraded over time beginning at least as early as two weeks post event. At about 12 months the memory trace stabilized, resisting further degradation. Repeated interviewing did not have any negative affect upon accuracy, contrary to concerns in the literature. Analysis by correlation and regression indicated no effect or predictive power for participant age, emotionality, confidence, or student status, as related to accuracy of recall; nor was participant confidence in accuracy predicted by emotional impact as hypothesized. Results also indicate that, contrary to the notions of investigators and jurors, witnesses become more inaccurate over time regardless of their confidence in their memories, even for highly emotional events. ^

On the Threshold of Paradise and Present: Memory in Contemporary Cuban – American Literature

The exile leaving his or her homeland for new and unknown territory travels with much more than just luggage and the clothes on his or her back. He or she carries a weighty collection of memories. Available for the exile in times when the harmony of the past is far removed from the difficult circumstances present during the process of cultural assimilation, these memories present an opportunity for the exile to fashion for him or herself an identity that mimics the realities of life in the home left behind. In this creative endeavor, I seek to examine the powerful potential of memory as it is exercised by a collection of Cubans and Cuban-Americans in different corners of the United States. Analyzing Achy Obejas’ Memory Mambo, Cristina García’s Dreaming in Cuban, Ana Menéndez’s In Cuba I Was a German Shepherd, and Elías Miguel Muñoz’s Brand New Memory, I aim to trace the suggestive potential of memory as it is used by each of the characters in these works in an effort to reconcile their Cuban identities with the ones that are in the process of creation in the U.S. I will borrow from a collection of literature dealing with identity and exile, relevant graduate-level theses on Cuban-American literature, as well as theoretical perspectives on memory formation and nostalgia in order to trace the various ways in which memory is relied on in the process of cultural assimilation and emotional coping. Being presented in Miami, which hosts the largest concentration of Cuban immigrants, this thesis aims to present itself as a reflective tool for Cubans and Cuban-Americans who may find value in seeing their personal sentiments portrayed in literature, thus allowing for a potential reevaluation of identity. If the existing literature on my topic of analysis reveals anything, it is that the scope of my project is one that has not been inspected previously, thus making my analytical contribution a new one that will add a new interpretive set of lens through which readers of contemporary Cuban-American literature can examine the works.

On the Threshold of Paradise and Present: Memory in Contemporary Cuban‐American Literature

The exile leaving his or her homeland for new and unknown territory travels with much more than just luggage and the clothes on his or her back. He or she carries a weighty collection of memories. Available for the exile in times when the harmony of the past is far removed from the difficult circumstances present during the process of cultural assimilation, these memories present an opportunity for the exile to fashion for him or herself an identity that mimics the realities of life in the home left behind. In this creative endeavor, I seek to examine the powerful potential of memory as it is exercised by a collection of Cubans and Cuban-Americans in different corners of the United States. Analyzing Achy Obejas’ Memory Mambo, Cristina García’s Dreaming in Cuban, Ana Menéndez’s In Cuba I Was a German Shepherd, and Elías Miguel Muñoz’s Brand New Memory, I aim to trace the suggestive potential of memory as it is used by each of the characters in these works in an effort to reconcile their Cuban identities with the ones that are in the process of creation in the U.S. I will borrow from a collection of literature dealing with identity and exile, relevant graduate-level theses on Cuban-American literature, as well as theoretical perspectives on memory formation and nostalgia in order to trace the various ways in which memory is relied on in the process of cultural assimilation and emotional coping. Being presented in Miami, which hosts the largest concentration of Cuban immigrants, this thesis aims to present itself as a reflective tool for Cubans and Cuban-Americans who may find value in seeing their personal sentiments portrayed in literature, thus allowing for a potential reevaluation of identity. If the existing literature on my topic of analysis reveals anything, it is that the scope of my project is one that has not been inspected previously, thus making my analytical contribution a new one that will add a new interpretive set of lens through which readers of contemporary Cuban-American literature can examine the works.