Binding Errors and their Relationship to Object-Present and Object-Absent Motion Events

The current study sought to examine further the concept of
eyewitness memory for events. Specifically, using filmed events that were
performed with objects and events performed without objects, we explored
the potential interaction of the object cue and binding or conjunction
errors. This specific memory error involves improperly pairing two or more
feature memories together in the long-term store. In our study, these
features were the action and the actress performing the action. Our study
involved 51 participants. Participants were shown target events in Week 1
and asked to retrieve the target events from a larger group of events in
Week 2. While findings did not show the expected interaction of
conjunction events to object presence or absence, objects without an
object showed a significantly higher acceptance rate. A secondary analysis revealed an interaction effect between head-focus and
recognition item type, meaning participants did view events without an
object differently from objects with an object.