Virtually True: Children's acquisition of false memories in virtual reality

I recently had the opportunity to read a journal article by the title above.  What caught me on first glance was how pertinent it was to my teaching subject matter: media literacy.  Our students these days are more and more often presented with images of children in new and exciting situations.  When added to the repetitive nature of advertising and the ubiquitous media experience of today's child, I was very interested in seeing what the study had found.

The study begins by suggesting a simple way to categorize how media-rich a medium is.  Each medium can be broken down into four subsets - Feedback, Multiple Cues, Language Variety, and Personal Focus.  A virtual world scores highly as it can provide immediate feedback to the user; allows for cues both of a visual and auditory nature - and in more advanced units even touch and taste; includes spoken, written, and body language in as many different languages as the user can comprehend; and, with the right avatar, it can be a highly personal experience as a child can watch him- or herself carrying out an action.

What quickly caught my attention was the line, "The representation of the self can be a powerful factor in eliciting false memories in preschool and elementary children."  The study continues to find that while very young children are already highly susceptible to false memories, school-aged children are more prone to false memories that come from a virtual experience.

Many of my students are participants in numerous virtual worlds.  While not as personal and inclusive as the method used in this study, I have to wonder how children handle participating in both real and virtual worlds on a daily basis.  It is hard enough to teach children the difference between fantasy and reality at a young age - what happens if they remember doing things that they later find out are impossible in real life?

Yet the more important question is really this: If I remember swimming with sharks in a virtual world, is that a false memory? Did I have the experience or not?  While the authors of the study would point out that it is a false memory because I have never physically been in that situation, I have to wonder.  Is a virtual friendship less real than a physical one? Does there need to be a difference between the real and the virtual, or is it all just a part of the larger experience?

Segovia, K. Y., & Bailenson, J. N. (2009). Virtually true: Children's acquisition of false memories in virtual reality. Media Psychology, 12, 371 - 393.