Imagining novel futures: The roles of event plausibility and familiarity

• Published in: Memory (Hove) Vol. 20; no. 5; pp. 443 - 451
• Main Author: Anderson, Rachel J.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Hove Taylor & Francis Group 01.07.2012; Psychology Press
• Subjects: Adult; Biological and medical sciences; Episodic memory; Event plausibility; Familiarity; Female; Forecasting; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Future thinking; Human; Humans; Imagination; Learning. Memory; Male; Memory; Memory, Episodic; Mental Recall; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychology. Psychophysiology; Recognition (Psychology); Recombination; Self-reference; Simulation; Human; Simulation; Self-reference; Future thinking; Cognition; Anticipation; Experimental study; Familiarity; Episodic memory; Event plausibility
• ISSN: 0965-8211; 1464-0686
• DOI: 10.1080/09658211.2012.677450

The constructive episodic simulation hypothesis suggests that episodic memory supports the simulation of future events through extraction and recombination of stored information. The current study explicitly investigated the use of past episodic thought in the simulation of future scenarios. Participants simulated one of three possible scenarios, differing in plausibility and participants' prior experience of similar events. Participants recorded related memories and whether they were explicitly used during future event simulation. Memories were rated for source (self-experienced, other-experienced, or media). Findings suggest prior experience and event plausibility did not impact upon ease of future event simulation or the extent of memory usage during simulations. Differences emerged in the source of information used to assist future event simulation. These findings provide support for the hypothesis that episodic memories from a variety of sources are recombined when generating future simulations of novel events.