title: Vicarious memories.
abstract: People not only have vivid memories of their own personal experiences, but also vicarious memories of events that happened to other people. To compare the phenomenological and functional qualities of personal and vicarious memories, college students described a specific past event that they had recounted to a parent or friend, and also an event that a friend or parent had recounted to them. Although ratings of memory vividness, emotional intensity, visualization, and physical reactions were higher for personal than for vicarious memories, the overall pattern of ratings was similar. Participants' ratings also indicated that vicarious memories serve many of the same life functions as personal memories, although at lower levels of intensity. The findings suggest that current conceptions of autobiographical memory, which focus on past events that happened directly to the self, should be expanded to include detailed mental representations of specific past events that happened to other people.
authors.affiliation: University of New Hampshire, Department of Psychology, 15 Academic Way, Durham, NH 03824, USA. Electronic address: david.pillemer@unh.edu.
authors.forename: David B
authors.initials: DB
authors.lastname: Pillemer
authors.affiliation: University of New Hampshire, Department of Psychology, 15 Academic Way, Durham, NH 03824, USA. Electronic address: Kristina.Steiner@unh.edu.
authors.forename: Kristina L
authors.initials: KL
authors.lastname: Steiner
authors.affiliation: University of New Hampshire, Department of Psychology, 15 Academic Way, Durham, NH 03824, USA. Electronic address: Kie.Kuwabara@unh.edu.
authors.forename: Kie J
authors.initials: KJ
authors.lastname: Kuwabara
authors.affiliation: Aarhus University, Department of Psychology and Behavioural Sciences, Bartholins Allé 9, Building 1340, 8000 Aarhus C, Denmark. Electronic address: dorthet@psy.au.dk.
authors.forename: Dorthe Kirkegaard
authors.initials: DK
authors.lastname: Thomsen
authors.affiliation: University of Notre Dame, Center for Philosophy of Religion, 418 Malloy Hall, Notre Dame, IN 46556, USA. Electronic address: svob@ualberta.ca.
authors.forename: Connie
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Svob
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D005260:Female; D033062:Friends; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D061212:Memory, Episodic; D011939:Mental Recall / Q000502:physiology*; D008875:Middle Aged; D010290:Parents; D063545:Personal Narratives as Topic; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Autobiographical memory; Episodic memory; Memory functions; Vicarious trauma