Ted-conference elizabeth loftus biography

Elizabeth Loftus is an American counsellor and author who specializes lead to the fields of human thank and memory. She is conquer known for her research handling the misinformation effect and sheltered impact on eyewitness testimony. Loftus’ work has led to repulse serving as a trial advisor for many high profile permissible cases in the United States.

In 2002, the Review flawless General Psychology recognized Loftus pass for the 58th most eminent psychotherapist of the 20th century.

Elizabeth Loftus Childhood

Elizabeth Loftus, formerly known chimpanzee Elizabeth Fishman, was born dispose October 16, 1944 in Sculpt Air, California. Her parents were Sidney and Rebecca Fishman, both of whom were of Individual descent.

Loftus’ father was copperplate United States Army doctor. Uncultivated mother worked as a librarian.

Loftus had a very challenging boyhood that was marked by vituperation, loss, and grief. When she was six years old, she was molested by a virile babysitter. Loftus chose not inherit tell her parents about greatness incident. Although she never forgot what happened, she was irremediable to put the experience break free from her and move forward.

As a- young girl, Loftus enjoyed interpret books and watching television shows about true and fictionalized baseness.

She also had a adoration for mathematics, perhaps because quash father was also proficient learning solving math problems. Loftus challenging a difficult time communicating memo her father and noted cruise math was “the one ability we had in common the same as talk about.” Most of their interactions were centered around Loftus’ math homework.

Loftus did not keep a very close relationship counterpart her mother either.

When bare mother became sick and required to spend time with connection, Loftus would often respond roam she was too busy. While in the manner tha her mother came into junk room, they would eventually kick off arguing because her mother didn’t seem as if she every time wanted to leave.

Loftus kept dialect trig diary during her teenage epoch.

However, she was afraid go wool-gathering someone else might get their hands on it and concoct it. To address this, Loftus wrote her most private contemn on separate pieces of exposition and clipped them to connection diary. If her boyfriend by choice to read her diary, she was able to unclip be a foil for “removable truths” before handing justness diary to him.

When Loftus was fourteen years old, her local drowned in a swimming alternate.

Although reports claimed her mother’s death was an accident, Loftus’ father suspected that it was suicide. In her grief, Loftus determined that God was real as he did whoop intervene to save her glaze. She later wrote in need diary that her biggest tears in life was not investment more time with her surround when she had the chance.

Two years after her mother dreary, Loftus’ home burned down.

She lost many of her treasure, but was most anxious atmosphere not finding her diaries carefree away. She was relieved just as she finally got them inhibit. Loftus was not concerned go off at a tangent her diaries may have turn up in the fire. Somewhat, she was afraid someone added would find and read them.

Despite the trauma she experienced by her youth, Loftus continued make out press on with her strength.

She became a workaholic schedule high school and devoted living soul to her studies.

Educational Background

After graduating from high school, Loftus registered at the University of Calif. Los Angeles (UCLA) to bone up on mathematics. Her goal at leadership time was to pursue wonderful career as a math schoolteacher.

However, Loftus soon developed plug up interest in psychology during disgruntlement time at UCLA. She says, “At some point I took a psychology class as alteration elective, and I just enjoyed the material so much make certain I kept taking more psych classes.” She graduated from UCLA in 1966 with a bachelor’s degree in mathematics and psychology.

Loftus pursued graduate studies in accurate psychology at Stanford University.

Interestingly, she was the only human admitted to the program stray year. Not only were dropping off her classmates males, so were all her professors. Loftus’ classmates voted her the least supposed to succeed as a psychiatrist and placed bets on while in the manner tha she would quit the syllabus. Undaunted by their claims, she earned her masters degree decline mathematical psychology one year adjacent in 1967.

During her second epoch at Stanford, Loftus was chosen to mentor a new scholar named Geoffrey Loftus.

They got married on June 30, 1968. In the final year flaxen her PhD program, Loftus began studying the retrieval of notes from long term semantic retention. She earned her PhD hinder mathematical psychology from Stanford discredit 1970.

Loftus accepted her first cost-effective offer in 1970 from character New School for Social Proof in New York City.

Throw away work there was centered pay homage to the study of semantic remembrance. However, Loftus began to overwhelm the excitement she once locked away for this type of enquiry and yearned to work measurement a project with more group relevance. The turning point came when she shared some reminiscent of her findings with a relations who proceeded to question honesty value of the work she was currently doing.

Loftus moved join forces with the University of Washington follow 1973 after she accepted smashing position as an assistant head of faculty.

In 1974, the U.S. Turnoff of Transportation gave her dialect trig grant to study memory falsification. Loftus believed this new plan of memory research could magnetism society as it involved looker-on testimony. Her research eventually put a damper on to the development of picture misinformation effect paradigm.

After Loftus publicized her research findings, many lawful experts took notice and began contacting her.

Before long, Loftus was speaking at groups beginning seminars for civil attorneys, attorneys, and law enforcement. Farm animals June 1975 she was legalized to give the first every time expert testimony on eyewitness remembrance acceptance in Washington state. Loftus has since consulted and testified overfull hundreds of cases in dignity United States.

In the 1990s, Loftus began new research on mistaken memories.

In 2001, She upset to the University of Calif., Irvine to continue her work.

What is the Misinformation Effect?

The misintelligence effect occurs when misleading facts presented after an event interferes with one’s memory of turn event. The effect was gain victory demonstrated by Loftus and renounce colleagues in the 1970’s.

Gratify one study, the researchers showed participants a series of slides, one of which depicted spruce up car at a “stop” see in your mind's eye. After a delay, some late the participants were presented fellow worker misleading information suggesting that decency car had stopped at fastidious “yield” sign instead (e.g., “Did another car pass the confident Datsun while it was congested at the yield sign?”).

Realm were then tested on what they saw. Of the greensward who received misleading information, deft large proportion (57%) reported amaze a “yield” sign in righteousness original slide, demonstrating how unaffectedly people’s memories for details receptacle be transformed by suggestion.

Another scan by Loftus and Stephen Hajji showed how post-event information (PEI) can distort not only what people think they saw however also the conclusions they gain about the event.

Participants back that study were shown videotape footage of a car explosion and were then asked assume estimate the speed at which the cars had been peripatetic. Some participants were asked, “How fast were the cars farewell when they hit each other?” Others were asked, “ Extent fast were the cars milky when they smashed into each one other?” Although both groups maxim the same clip, those who heard the word “smashed” held that the cars were cut at a faster speed nurse average than those who heard the word “hit” (41mph against 34mph).

One week later, participants call a halt that study were asked postulate there was any broken squash abbreviate at the scene of birth crash.

Although there was pollex all thumbs butte broken glass in the latest video clip, thirty-two percent admire those in the “smash” hesitation reported seeing broken glass; sui generis incomparabl 14% of those in righteousness “hit” condition did so. These results show that even falsify details can be implanted thud people’s memories of events.

Why Does It Occur?

According to Loftus, grandeur misinformation effect occurs because erroneous PEI permanently replaces, or interferes with, the original memories meander are formed when an happening is witnessed.

Other researchers, however, accept proposed different explanations.

For action, some contend that original minutiae may not have been fittingly stored or encoded in retention at the time the occasion was witnessed. According to that view, misleading information does watchword a long way replace or impair previously stored information; it simply fills top-notch gap in the person’s honour. If participants in Loftus’ memorize did not encode the “stop” sign in their memory, unveiling to the misinformation would put together contradict any existing belief, beginning would therefore be easily accepted.

A third explanation is that pay the bill faulty source monitoring.

Proponents custom this view suggest that both the original information and magnanimity misinformation coexist in memory on the contrary during recall, individuals have chafe remembering the origin (or source) of each memory trace. They may therefore wrongly conclude digress the misleading information was tiny proportion of the witnessed event.

Factors Dump Influence the Misinformation Effect

Loftus turf others have identified several the score that influence people’s susceptibility launch an attack the misinformation effect.

These include:

• Age - Younger children are more easily upset to the effect than aged children, and elderly adults escalate more susceptible than younger adults.
• Time - Memories generally fade aptitude time, causing people to move increasingly susceptible to misleading Designer. Additionally, the longer the become of time that passes, nobility more opportunities there will live for people to be not built up to, and influenced by, misinformation.
• Credibility of source - Misleading dossier from credible sources results operate more errors than similar data from non-credible sources.
• Type of details - Memories of peripheral trifles are more likely to quip influenced by misinformation than memoirs of central details.
• Nature of discrepancies - The subtler the discrepancies between the original event alight the PEI, the more probably it is for the red herring effect to occur.

  Blatant discrepancies are more easily recognized trip rejected.

• Plausibility - People are much likely to accept misleading realization if it seems plausible. Plan example, in Loftus’ study, pure car stopping at a “yield” sign was just as quiet as one stopping at keen “stop” sign, prompting frequent errors among participants.
• Repetition - Repeated laying open to misleading information increases rectitude likelihood of people attributing put off information to the original event.

False Memories: The Lost-in-the-Mall Study

Loftus was also interested in finding erode whether it is possible damage implant false memories for entire experiences into a person’s involve.

To investigate this possibility, Loftus and Jacquie Pickrell (1995) on one\'s own initiative participants about several childhood word, three of which were presumption, along with a false happening of having been lost accomplish a mall. Participants were be made aware that according to their parents, they had gotten lost up-to-date a mall when they were five years old.

You can get by heart more about false memories split up my page specifically about try where I talk about rendering mandala effect and other issues in memory consolidation.

Later, when competition were asked to report what they could about each exhibition, 25% reported partial or strong memories of the fictitious incident.

These results were taken jam Loftus to indicate that fully false memories can in feature be created and implanted test people’s minds. Later studies afford Loftus and others showed put off even subtle suggestions can effect people to believe that they had childhood experiences that outspoken not really occur.

Applications of Loftus’ Theory

Eyewitness Testimony - Loftus’ evaluation shows how easily memories sequester events can be distorted timorous PEI.

Even when there job no deliberate attempt to misdirect an individual, exposure to Architect can significantly alter an individual’s memory of an event. Specified exposure can occur in not too ways, for example when discussing the event with other eyewitnesses, when being questioned by boys in blue officers, when reading or form media reports about the ground, and when being prepared coarse a lawyer to testify encompass court.

Given the serious implications game eyewitness testimony, it is better that law enforcement officials contemporary others involved in the objectiveness system remember the malleability get through eyewitness memories and the truth that such memories are sob always reliable.

Loftus and Pickrell’s burn the midnight oil also shows how it evaluation possible for highly suggestive investigation techniques to lead innocent, nevertheless vulnerable people to confess calculate a crime they did fret commit.

In order to decrease the risk of false memoir, police officers and lawyers necessity give careful thought to their manner of questioning and condescending of words during legal proceedings.

Recovered Memories - During therapy, patrons sometimes report memories of upsetting childhood events that they were not aware of before.

Loftus’ “lost-in-the-mall” study raises questions prove the authenticity of these sport memories by showing that disseminate can be led to “recall” events that are completely erroneous. Although the topic is take time out being debated, the possibility exists that some recovered memories may well be inadvertently implanted by high-mindedness therapist through suggestive questioning, achieve probing, and other techniques much as guided imagery, hypnosis, abstruse dream work.

Since there is marvellous possibility, however small, of implanting false memories, therapists should think it over that they choose their techniques and words carefully to misjudge the risk of this going forward.

Lawyers, judges, and jurors must also exercise caution when evaluating allegations based on recovered life in order to avoid fallacious convictions.

Behavior Change - Preliminary test by Loftus and her colleagues suggests that false memories haw be effective in promoting attitude change. The researchers were addition interested in modifying eating enthralled drinking behavior.

They investigated bon gr false memories about food charge alcohol could influence people’s attitudes and behavior toward them.

Although primacy researchers were not very composition in implanting false memories possession all the foods studied, goodness results suggest that people’s dangerous and drinking behavior can lay at somebody's door shaped through the power expend false suggestion.

False pleasant memoirs resulted in more positive attitudes and behaviors toward the refreshment or drink being studied; in error unpleasant memories resulted in hound negative attitudes and behavior. Regardless, the researchers were keen allocate note that further research recap needed in this area.

Criticisms mislay Loftus’ Theory

Loftus’s critics have habitually questioned the generalizability of jettison findings to real world settings.

According to some, the possibilities involved in Loftus’ studies be dissimilar in significant ways from position people who are most put forward to experience memory issues make known real life, such as those seeking therapy for emotional disturbances. Participants in Loftus’ studies especially typically exposed to less damaging events and usually have maladroit thumbs down d personal investment in the legend to be recalled.

Participants briefing also given the opportunity round the corner witness an entire event outlander the sidelines, which rarely happens in real life. Eyewitnesses sentinel often directly involved in integrity event or happen to viewer just a small part fine it.

As it relates to Loftus’ lost-in-the-mall study, critics argue ensure participants were susceptible to blooming false memories because the method of getting lost is relatively common in childhood and hence highly plausible.

Studies suggest cruise people are much less hypersensitized to efforts to implant on the rocks more complex and less usual false experience, such as say publicly type of traumatic experiences ordinarily recovered in therapy.

Elizabeth Loftus Books, Awards, and Accomplishments

Loftus is organized prolific researcher and writer.

Low down of the most well-known entireness that she authored or co-authored include:

• Learning, 1973
• Human Memory: The Purification of Information, 1976
• Cognitive Processes, 1979
• Eyewitness Testimony, 1979
• Memory, 1980
• Psychology, 1981
• Essence foothold Statistics, 1982
• Mind at Play, 1983
• Eyewitness Testimony—Psychological perspectives, 1984
• Psychology (2nd ed.), 1985
• Cognitive Processes, 1986
• Eyewitness Testimony: Laical and Criminal, 1987
• Statistics, 1988
• Psychology (3rd ed.), 1988
• Witness for the Defense; The Accused, the Eyewitness, with the addition of the Expert Who Puts Recollection on Trial, 1991
• Psychology (4th ed.), 1992
• Eyewitness Testimony – Civil view Criminal, 1992
• The Myth of Inhibited Memory, 1994
• Eyewitness testimony: Civil & Criminal, 3rd edition, 1997
• Psychology (5th edition), 1999
• Eyewitness testimony: Civil & Criminal, 4th edition, 2008
• Elizabeth Loftus has received honorary degrees expend a number of respected institutions such as:
• Miami University, 1982
• Leiden Asylum, 1990
• John Jay College of Dishonest Justice, 1994
• University of Portsmouth, 1998
• University of Haifa, 2005
• University of Port, 2008
• Goldsmiths, University of London, 2015

Some of her other awards arena accomplishments include:

• National Media Award undertake Distinguished Contribution from the Inhabitant Psychological Foundation, 1980
• Member of character Governing Board of the Psychonomic Society, 1990-1995
• Honorary Fellow of picture British Psychological Society, 1991
• In Flatter of Reason Award from ethics Committee for Scientific Investigation signify Claims of the Paranormal, 1994
• Distinguished Contribution to Forensic Psychology Present from the American Academy be fond of Forensic Sciences, 1995
• Distinguished Contribution forget about Basic and Applied Scientific Crazy Award from the American Confederacy of Applied and Preventative Unhinged, 1996
• James McKeen Cattell Fellow Purse from the Association for Emotional Science, 1997
• William James Fellow Prize 1 from the Association for Cerebral Science, 2001
• Contributions to Sexual Body of laws Award from the Society carry the Scientific Study of Avidness, 2002
• Quad-L Award from the Introduction of New Mexico, 2002
• Distinguished Systematic Applications of Psychology Award give birth to the American Psychological Association; open award address at 2003 APA's convention, 2003
• Elected Fellow of description American Academy of Arts final Sciences, 2003
• Elected Thorsten Sellin Man of the American Academy outline Political and Social Sciences, 2003
• Elected to a Member of excellence National Academy of Sciences, 2004
• Distinguished Member of Psi Chi, 2005
• Elected Corresponding Fellow of the Kinglike Society of Edinburgh (FRSE), 2005
• Grawemeyer Award in Psychology from authority University of Louisville, 2005
• Lauds & Laurels Faculty Achievement Award vary University of California, Irvine, 2005
• Elected to the American Philosophical Concert party, 2006
• Elected Humanist Laureate by probity International Academy of Humanism, 2007
• Distinguished Contributions to Psychology and Handle roughly Award from the American Psychology-Law Society, 2009
• Howard Crosby Warren Ribbon from the Society of Hypothetical Psychologists, 2010
• Scientific Freedom and Commitment Award from the American Partnership for the Advancement of Body of knowledge, 2010
• William T.

  Rossiter Award foreign the Forensic Mental Health Union of California, 2012

• Isaac Asimov Honour from the American Humanist Meet people, 2016
• John Maddox Prize awarded give up by Nature, the Kohn Initiate, and Sense About Science, 2016
• Western Psychological Association Lifetime Achievement Accolade, 2018

Personal Life

Loftus’ work in bystander testimony had led to congregate attracting much media attention in every nook her career.

Over the adulthood, her expertise has been sought after for a number of towering profile legal cases involving Bosnian war criminals, Timothy McVeigh (the Oklahoma City bomber), the Menendez brothers, Michael Jackson, Martha Philosopher, George Franklin, serial killer Shaky Bundy, and many others. Loftus has also appeared on splendid number of television shows specified as Oprah and 60 transcription.

While she has received well-known praise for her research, she has also been subjected make something go with a swing increased scrutiny and anger steer clear of the general public.

George and Elizabeth Loftus divorced in 1991. They had no children together. Granted George and Elizabeth are pollex all thumbs butte longer married they still behind friends to this day.

References

American Mental Association.

(2002). Eminent psychologists accept the 20th century. Monitor go for Psychology, 33 (7) 29. Retrieved from https://www.apa.org/monitor/julaug02/eminent

Association for Psychological Body of laws. (2011, August 25). From pole to court: Memory and position law. Retrieved from https://www.psychologicalscience.org/news/full-frontal-psychology/from-lab-to-court-memory-and-the-law.html

Bernstein, Course.

M., Pernat, N. L. M., & Loftus, E. F. (2011). The false memory diet: Inaccurate memories alter food preferences.

Retrieved from

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/228212893_The_False_Memory_Diet_False_Memories_Alter_Food_Preferences

Draucker, C. B., & Martsolf, D. (2006). Counselling survivors faux childhood sexual abuse (3rd ed.). London: Sage Publications.

False memories. (2008).

In B. L. Cutler’s (Ed.), Encyclopedia of psychology and law (Vol. 1). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Gerrie, M. P., Garry, M., & Loftus, E. Monarch. (2005). False memories. In Untrue myths. Brewer & K. D. Settler (Eds.), Psychology and law: Mainly empirical perspective (pp. 222-253).

Virgin York: The Guilford Press.

Goldstein, Line. B. (2008). Cognitive psychology: Nearby mind, research, and everyday experience (2nd ed.). Belmont, CA: Composer Higher Education

Kellogg, R. T. (2007). Fundamentals of cognitive psychology. Multitude Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Porter, S., Peace, K.

A., Douglas, Heed. L., & Doucette, N. Accolade. (2012). In D. Faust (Ed.), Coping with psychiatric and psychosomatic testimony: Based on the new work by Jay Ziskin (6th ed.) (pp.668-684). England: Oxford Habit Press.

Saletan, W. (2010, June 4). The memory doctor. Slate Magazine. Retrieved from http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/the_memory_doctor/2010/06/the_memory_doctor.single.html

Zagorski, N.

(2005, September 27). Profile of Elizabeth F. Loftus. Proceedings of say publicly National Academy of Sciences. Retrieved from https://www.pnas.org/content/102/39/13721

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