William is shopping at a convenience store when a man rushes in, shoots the store clerk in the arm, hurriedly cleans out the cash register, and then speeds away in a pickup truck. Later, a detective asks William to describe the woman who was waiting for the thief in the truck. The fact is, William didn't see a woman in the truck, but after the detective urges him to "think hard and try to remember her," he begins to recall seeing a blonde woman sitting in the passenger side of the truck. This situation illustrates:
A) the misinformation effect
B) an associative retrieval cue
C) spreading activation
D) encoding specificity

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

This situation illustrates the misinformation effect, which occurs when a person's memory of an event is altered by misleading information given after the event. In this case, the detective's suggestion that there was a woman in the truck influenced William's memory, resulting in him reporting seeing a woman even though he initially did not. The other options, associative retrieval cue, spreading activation, and encoding specificity, are all memory phenomena but are not directly applicable to this situation.

William Is Shopping at a Convenience Store When a Man