Source confusion or unconscious transference, is a form of memory error that involves the misattribution of the source of a memory. For instance, an individual may recall seeing an event in person when in reality they only witnessed the event on television. [1] Ultimately, the individual has an inability to remember the source of information in which the content and the source become dissociated. This may be more likely for more distant memories.
In more severe cases of source confusion, individuals can take fictional stories heard from childhood and assimilate these stories as their own childhood. For example, say your father told you stories about his life when he was a child every night before you went to sleep when you were a child. When you grow up, you might mistakenly remember these stories your dad told you as your own and integrate them into your childhood memories. [3]
Application
As 🏷️#applied-psychology, source confusion is utilized by marketers to position purchasing decisions as having originated from within the customer's mind. This can often be accomplished by substituting 📝Subject (philosophy) with objective, enabling the audience to add their perspective.
📝Priming is one of the most common campaign strategies for catalyzing source confusion as it seeds multiple, diverse content placements and with the campaign objective of daily unique reach—rather than engagement, click, conversion, etc.—to place an advertiser's true objective in the subconscious mind of their target audience.
References
- Law and Human Behaviour, 30(3), 287–307
- Creating false memories, Scientific American, 277, 70–75
- 'Searching for memory: the brain, the mind, and the past', (New York, 1996)