Can you trust your memory? Probably not.
Research shows that we can be convinced fairly easily that we are guilty of a crime we did not commit. We not only misremember information, but we can misremember information about the wrong person. Add to that the fact that when someone else tells us how they remember something, it can alter our memory of that same event, person, or situation.
These insights, along with many others from memory research, are changing how we think about law and order, learning, and what makes us human. False memory researcher and criminal psychologist, Julia Shaw, is one of only a handful of experts in the field. A senior lecturer and researcher in the Department of Law and Social Sciences at London South Bank University and author of The Memory Illusion: Remembering, Forgetting, and the Science of False Memory, she works with members of the military and law enforcement. She is also a regular contributor to Scientific American.
In this interview, we talk about:

What the blue-gold dress phenomenon revealed about how our brains work
Why we need less evidence to convict someone who looks less trustworthy
Why we form stronger memories when others are same race, age, or gender
Why we reminisce most strongly about moments from our teens and 20s
Why we have rosy memories of most of our firsts in life
What actually happens in our brains when we form a memory
How memories get stamped in our brains
The fact that we simply cannot multitask - it is humanly impossible - and why
Why it is that whenever we remember we also forget
How to get someone to think they saw Bugs Bunny at Disneyland
Why we should write things down rather than try to remember them
Why understanding how unreliable our memories can be is liberating
How attention is the glue between reality and your memory
The vital importance of sleep to build lasting memories
How we all suffer from overconfidence when it comes to our memories
Why there is a right way to ask questions when we need to gather information
How to avoid asking leading questions that may create false memories
How photos can prompt false memories
The fact that we implant false memories in each other all the time
How creating memories with others may ensure more accurate memories
How social media can result in muddled memories
Why we need to continually update memories to learn
Why the flexibility of our brains -- and our memories -- is a beautiful thing
How we can convince people they committed crimes that never happened
How false memory research can change the legal system
How we can mistake the false memories of others for lying

Selected Links to Topics Mentioned
http://www.drjuliashaw.com/
@drjuliashaw
London South Bank University
The Dress
Own race bias
Reminiscence bump
Rohypnol
Retrieval-induced forgetting
The Honest Truth about Dishonesty by Dan Ariely
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