Motivated False Memory
通过大规模实验发现，人们倾向于错误记忆积极事件、遗忘消极事件，且积极错误记忆与现时偏好相关，而选择性遗忘则不然；模型表明积极错误记忆能增强对未来自我的信心。
People often forget and sometimes fantasize. This paper reports a large-scale experiment on memory errors and their relation to preferential traits including time preference, attitudes toward risk and ambiguity, and psychological characteristics such as anticipatory feelings. We observe systematic incidences of false memory in favor of positive events and positive amnesia in forgetting past negative events. Both positive delusion and positive confabulation significantly relate to present bias, but this is not the case for positive amnesia. In an intraperson, multiple-self model, we demonstrate that positive false memory, rather than selective amnesia, serves to enhance confidence in one’s future self in equilibrium, thereby accounting for our experimental findings.