Do You Remember?

Seriously, do you?

To show the power of suggestive questioning and the ability to implant memories into the human mind, researchers showed two groups of people in the same car accident on video.  Both groups witnessed the exact same thing.

They asked one group "How fast were the cars going when they smashed into each other?" and the other group, "How fast were the cars going when they made contact?"  Changing only the verb used in the question.  The group that was asked about the speed of the "made contact" group estimated that the cars were going about 32 MPH whereas the group that was asked about the speed of the cars that "smashed into"one another at around 41 MPH.  Not that big of a deal, right?  

When they asked the groups if they saw broken glass at the scene, the group that was asked about the cars "smashing" into one another recorded seeing broken glass 3x higher than the "made contact" group.  The problem here is that there was no broken glass at all.  By simply asking the questions two different ways, the questioner was able to implant an idea about the accident by simply changing the wording of the question, and the witnesses, without deliberately lying came up with different answers. Lawyers do this to unsuspecting witnesses, as do the police.  If nothing else, be aware of...keep reading