In social psychology, a transmission chain is when information is passed between people sequentially, each person in the chain usually modifying the information they were given. This is similar to the telephone game. The transmission chain method is a method used in cultural evolution research to uncover biases in cultural transmission.[1] This method was first developed by Frederic Bartlett in 1932.[2][1]
Application in studies of memory
editThe transmission chain method is used to reveal what elements of a story the participants are most likely to remember, as well as how they transform the elements of the story.[3] Bartlett's pioneering book, Remembering describes a series of studies of transmission of various material, from Native American folk tales to descriptions of sporting events. From these he made two major inferences, corroborated by later studies: loss of the detail and dependence of the quality of remembering on the pre-existing knowledge. From these he inferred that remembering is a process of reconstruction of information, rather than of replication.[1]
See also
editReferences
edit- ^ a b c Mesoudi, Alex; Whiten, Andrew (2008-11-12). "The multiple roles of cultural transmission experiments in understanding human cultural evolution". Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. 363 (1509): 3489–3501. doi:10.1098/rstb.2008.0129. ISSN 0962-8436. PMC 2607337. PMID 18801720.
- ^ Wolters, A. W. (July 1933). "Remembering: A Study in Experimental and Social Psychology. By F. C. Bartlett. (Cambridge University Press. 1932)". Philosophy. 8 (31): 374–376. doi:10.1017/s0031819100033143. ISSN 0031-8191. S2CID 145357365. (book review)
- ^ Miton, Helena; Claidière, Nicolas; Mercier, Hugo (July 2015). "Universal cognitive mechanisms explain the cultural success of bloodletting". Evolution and Human Behavior. 36 (4): 303–312. Bibcode:2015EHumB..36..303M. doi:10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2015.01.003.
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