Abstract
Abstract For many decisions, we encounter relevant information over the course of days, months or years. We consume such information in various forms, including stories – qualitative content about individual instances – and statistics – quantitative data about collections of observations. This paper proposes that information type – story versus statistic – shapes selective memory. In controlled experiments, we document a pronounced story-statistic gap in memory: the average impact of statistics on beliefs fades by 73% over the course of a day, but the impact of a story fades by only 32%. Guided by a model of selective memory, we disentangle different mechanisms and document that similarity relationships drive this gap. Recall of a story increases when its qualitative content is more similar to a memory prompt. Irrelevant information in memory that is similar to the prompt, on the other hand, competes for retrieval with relevant information, impeding successful recall.
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