Who’s Got a Better Memory?

Have you ever had a small argument turn into a big fight when you and your partner remember an event differently? You are telling a story, and you notice your partner’s eyes are rolling in exasperation:

“That’s not how it happened!”

“Yes it is!”

And suddenly you find yourself arguing about what happened in the first place and who remembers it more accurately.

You are not alone if you’ve had a conversation like this.  Lots of couples find it irritating and exasperating when their partner seems to deliberately remember something inaccurately. We might feel like our partner doesn’t care enough to remember, or even worse, is trying to change the facts to suit their own agenda.

Now your partner may in fact be trying to pull the wool over your eyes, but it is more likely that both of you are facing the same issue:  our memories are extremely inaccurate, and every time we pull out a memory  we alter that memory as we remember it and re-file it in our brains.  To begin with we will all remember an event from our own perspective, but to make it even more complicated our memories will change as our feelings, thoughts, and information changes. We’re like a word processing file that can be updated and overwritten, erasing the previous information.

So we are often inaccurate in our memories. Memories change over time. Unfortunately what doesn’t change is feeling like we are right–hence the experience of two people angrily and doggedly fighting over what they remember. Our memories feel true, even if they aren’t. And most of us will go to the mat trying to prove it to our partner.

So what’s the solution? Ease up on the whole “who is right” approach–it won’t take you anywhere. If someone has a strong feeling about something you’ll get farther listening than arguing.  In the meantime you can go listen to Kathryn Schultz on “Being Wrong” if you’d like to hear more about the accuracy of memory.