Gideon
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How Psychology Solved A WWII Shipwreck Mystery (1 Viewer)
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johnnybach
Major General
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A very interesting story indeed. The decay in memory whilst passing on a message - and passing it on, is a well documented phenomenon - as in the old chestnut of a message supposedly sent during WW1. This (allegedly) began as;
"Send reinforcements we're going to advance"
But when passed in whispers down the line from one person to the next - became:
"Send three and fourpence, we're going to a dance"
When I was a student (many moons past) -I remember participating in a similar experiment, based on the party game "Chinese Whispers", where the task was to transmit a message from one to another over an obstacle course - using a different medium for the message each time. It was startling to see when the experiment was ove, how the message baecame altered as it moved from one person to the next. It very rarely succeedded in getting to the end of the chain in the same form as it began.
More seriously, perhaps - the same changes are frequently seen when someone describes witnessing an accident or a crime - and then later recalls things rather differently - as they try (subconsciously) to make some ordered sense of what they witnessed.
A fascinating tale indeed, of someone using the knowledge of this phenomenon to plot the approximate position of two sunken ships - but with a very positive, though sad, outcome in this case.
Quite surprising, sometimes, what a bit of applied psychology can achieve. johnnbach.
"Send reinforcements we're going to advance"
But when passed in whispers down the line from one person to the next - became:
"Send three and fourpence, we're going to a dance"
When I was a student (many moons past) -I remember participating in a similar experiment, based on the party game "Chinese Whispers", where the task was to transmit a message from one to another over an obstacle course - using a different medium for the message each time. It was startling to see when the experiment was ove, how the message baecame altered as it moved from one person to the next. It very rarely succeedded in getting to the end of the chain in the same form as it began.
More seriously, perhaps - the same changes are frequently seen when someone describes witnessing an accident or a crime - and then later recalls things rather differently - as they try (subconsciously) to make some ordered sense of what they witnessed.
A fascinating tale indeed, of someone using the knowledge of this phenomenon to plot the approximate position of two sunken ships - but with a very positive, though sad, outcome in this case.
Quite surprising, sometimes, what a bit of applied psychology can achieve. johnnbach.