Social Contagion and Conversational Recall With Different Levels of Discussion

Summary

The study examined how the levels of imposition and resistance of the participants change depending on their exposure to high or low levels of discussion about the past. In addition, the contribution of memory quality and the conversational roles was studied. Convenience sampling was used. The participants were 32 students of the Universidad de Belgrano, Argentina, who listened to 4 short stories (each participant heard a slightly different version). Dependent variables were measured through a memory task. Two levels of discussion (high versus low) were assessed. Besides, the quality of memories was manipulated (strong-context versus weak-no context). The efficacy of narrators versus non-narrators was also assessed. Two designs, one with 2 factors (Discussion, Context), and another with 3 factors (Discussion, Context, Narrator), were used. ANOVAs and Student's t tests were employed. Results show that (a) high levels of discussion foster social contagion, (b) narrators are only effective in imposing their memories in low discussion conditions, and (c) strong memories attenuate the levels of social contagion.