Talk:constructive memory
Would construcitve memory include memory of events that did happen but the only reason we have the memory is that we have built this memory based on other exposure to the event. For instance for a long time I have believed that my 1st memory (when I was 5) was of seeing my grandfather on a summer trip we had made. This was the only time I had seen my grandfather as he died the next year. He was sitting on a log on a beach with a pipe in his hand and talking to someone. I could not remember who. The memory is vivid since when ever I think of my grandfather for what ever reason this memory comes up.
I recently (50+ years later) question if this memory is real when I was shown a picture of my grandfather taken on that trip exectly as I remember him: sitting on a log on a beach with a pipe in his hand and apparently talking to someone who is not in the picture. I was there I did see this event but the fact I rememer it is not because I really remember it but because I have built the memory from .. stories about:
the trip, who we saw
where we went and of course the pricture.
I will never know but if it was "constructed" in this way could it still fall under this definition.