False Memory

American psychologist Elizabeth Loftus pioneered false memory research in the 1970s, demonstrating memory's malleability. Her 1974 study showed how suggestive wording—using "smashed" versus "hit"—altered witnesses' memories of car accidents, even creating memories of nonexistent broken glass. In the early 1990s, Loftus and student Jim Coan developed the "lost in the mall" technique, successfully implanting false childhood memories in about 25% of participants, reshaping understanding of memory reliability.