Investigating memories for emotional events

The primary aim of this present study was to investigate memories for emotional events, exploring specifically if fear memories are different to other emotions. 40 participants, 21 females and 19 males were recruited through opportunistic sampling. Participants watched two film clips, one eliciting the emotion of sadness and the other the emotion of fear. After each film clip participants received a film-rating questionnaire, which measured emotional arousal felt during the film, and a memory recall questionnaire that contained leading false questions and general questions to test immediate recall. Seven days later participants returned and were asked to complete two additional questionnaires to examine delayed recall. It was concluded that the false information in the fearful condition did not influence the participants' memory one week later, but did in the sad condition. However, participants answered more repeated questions correctly in week two in the sad condition than the fearful condition. To conclude there is some evidence to support the claim that fear memories are different to memories for other emotions. The implications of the results of this study are discussed in relation to future research. Keywords: PTSD, False memory, emotion, films, fearbsc_Psyunpub1346_ethesesunpu