Brown & Kulik (1977)
The Brown & Kulik study was done in order to investigate whether dramatic, or personally significant events can cause "flashbulb" memories. The study used a retrospective questionnaire who assessed their memories of actual events that had happened. The participants were asked about the assassination of JF Kennedy, and Martin Luther King junior. They were also asked about any significant event that had happened to them. The conclusion showed that, out of 80 participants, 73 reported flashbulb associated with personal events. JF Kennedy assassination was recalled most vividly. This showed that flashbulb memory is more likely to occur if the event was unexpected or happened to someone of importance. However Data that was collected came from questionnaires, so it is impossible to verify the accuracy of memories reported.
Neisser & Harsch (1992)
106 people filled out questionnaire the day after the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded (1986). Among the questions asked were 5 about how they heard the news: where they were, what they were doing, who told them, what time it occurred etc. Thirty-two months later the participants were asked to complete the questionnaire again and their results compared to the original. The results showed that out of 220 ‘facts’ produced in the original questionnaire, they were partially or completely wrong on 150 of them. however participants were not aware of this fall off in performance, being highly confident in their ability to recall accurately. In conclusion That study showed that flash-bulb memories are no more accurate than other memories. The results suggest that what is different is the confidence that people have in their memories associated with significant events. Although it can be questioned weather participants accurately reported their memories
Talarico & Rubin (2003)
On September 12 Talarico & Rubin gave 52 student volunteers a questionnaire about their memory of September 11 and an ordinary event of their choosing from the preceding few days. Talarico and Rubin then analyzed the responses to see if September 11 was remembered better than an ordinary event. In conclusion Participants were more likely to think their memories of 9/11 were accurate compared to their ordinary memories, and they reported those memories as being equally vivid, even months after the event. One flaw with this experiment is that it was done from memory which, can be altered very easily
