The Effect of Arousal on False Recall and False Recognition among Children

To investigate children false recall and false recognition under arousal, 100 elementary school students were presented lists of semantically associated words. All words in each list were associated with a non presented word or critical lure. The participants in arousal condition watched an emotionally exciting video clip and had exercise for some time. The results indicated that both groups had a relatively high false recall and false recognition. Also, the aroused participants had a higher rate of false memory than the control group. These findings are consistent with results of other researchers who showed that, false memories are significantly more frequent under conditions of high arousal.