Memory (Mis)Matches: Accurate and Biased Recall of Terror Suspects

Abstract

Evolutionary psychologists suggest that memory retention is enhanced for fitness-relevant stimuli, a notion commonly referred to as adaptive memory. Since intergroup conflict has been—and continues to be—associated with grave costs to our species, human beings should be more vigilant to coalitional threat cues. This study tests the assumption that recognition memory is enhanced for coalitional threat cues in the domain of terrorist violence. In a survey experiment on a nationally representative sample of 1473 white, American adults, participants were exposed to eight experimental vignettes including subtle coalitional threat cues pertaining to terror-suspect sex, ethnicity, and coalition size. The results suggest that male outgroup coalitions are associated with enhanced recognition memory. Further, those who failed to correctly recognize the threat cues exhibited tendencies for bias. Specifically, and in line with error management theory, participants who were exposed to female terror suspects, ingroup perpetrators, and individual perpetrators were more likely to commit false positive errors. Overall, these findings speak to our coalitional psychology, which continues to factor into intuitions about mass violence today. Not only do people seem more alert to cues implying coalitional aggression—associated biases might also reduce or distort the attention that threats from female suspects, lone wolves, and ingroup attackers receive at the level of public debate.