In the Loftus and Palmer experiment, participants who heard the word 'smashed' estimated that the cars were traveling at a much higher speed than participants who heard the word 'contacted'. The implied information about speed encouraged them to remember the cars were going faster.

Effect of Leading Questions on Speed Estimates

A follow-up to the Loftus and Palmer experiment conducted one week later showed that leading questions can create false memories. Participants who had been in the 'smashed' group were more than twice as likely to falsely remember seeing broken glass, despite none being shown in the accident pictures.

Creation of False Memories

Loftus and Palmer demonstrated that a leading question can affect a person's memory of an event. Their experiment showed that the implied information based on the specific verb used to describe a car accident influenced participants' subsequent recall of the event.

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The misinformation effect is the phenomenon that causes an eyewitness's memory of an event to be very flexible.

Misinformation Effect

Spielman, R. M., Jenkins, W. J., & Lovett, M. D. (2020, April 22). Psychology (2nd ed.). OpenStax. https://openstax.org/books/psychology-2e/pages/1-introduction

OpenStax Psychology (2nd ed.) Textbook

To test the theory of the misinformation effect, Loftus and John Palmer (1974) asked 45 U.S. college students to estimate the speed of cars using different forms of questions.

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