A study on the use of Flashbulb Memories features to discriminate true from fabricated autobiographical memories for negative events

Studies so far have strived to define the characteristics of autobiographical memories accounting for their veracity and accuracy. Our study aimed to test whether it is possible to distinguish between true and fabricated autobiographical memories by adopting the Flashbulb Memory Checklist (FBMC), a validated tool used to assess the phenomenological features of emotional autobiographical memories. We asked participants to first recall a negative event truly experienced in the last 12–18 months and report a negative event that they never experienced. We calculated the FBMC scores (i.e., FBM Specificity, FBM Confidence) and checked whether these would help to distinguish between true and fabricated memories for negative events. Our findings showed that FBMC scores can be informative for memories’ evaluation although they do not allow a proper discrimination between the two types of memories. The legal implications of our findings are discussed.