Exposure to misleading information after witnessing an event can impair future memory reports about the event. This pervasive form of memory distortion, termed the misinformation effect, can be significantly reduced if individuals are warned about the reliability of post-event information before exposure to misleading information. The present fMRI study investigated whether such prewarnings improve subsequent memory accuracy by influencing encoding-related neural activity during exposure to misinformation. We employed a repeated retrieval misinformation paradigm in which participants watched a crime video (Witnessed Event), completed an initial test of memory, listened to a post-event auditory narrative that contained consistent, neutral, and misleading details (Post-Event Information), and then completed a final test of memory. At the behavioral level, participants who were given a prewarning before the Post-Event Information were less susceptible to misinformation on the final memory test compared with participants who were not given a warning (Karanian et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 117, 22771–22779, 2020). This protection from misinformation was accompanied by greater activity in frontal regions associated with source encoding (lateral PFC) and conflict detection (ACC) during misleading trials as well as a more global reduction in activity in auditory cortex and semantic processing regions (left inferior frontal gyrus) across all trials (consistent, neutral, misleading) of the Post-Event Information narrative. Importantly, the strength of these warning-related activity modulations was associated with better protection from misinformation on the final memory test (improved memory accuracy on misleading trials). Together, these results suggest that warnings modulate encoding-related neural activity during exposure to misinformation to improve memory accuracy.

目睹事件后接触误导性信息可能会损害未来对该事件的记忆。如果个人在接触误导性信息之前就被警告事件后信息的可靠性，那么这种普遍存在的记忆扭曲形式（称为错误信息效应）就可以显着减少。目前的功能磁共振成像研究调查了这种预警是否可以通过影响接触错误信息期间与编码相关的神经活动来提高随后的记忆准确性。我们采用了重复检索错误信息范式，其中参与者观看犯罪视频（目击事件），完成初步记忆测试，聆听包含一致、中立和误导性细节的事件后听觉叙述（事件后信息），然后完成了最后的记忆测试。在行为层面，与没有收到警告的参与者相比，在事件后信息之前收到预警的参与者在最终记忆测试中更不容易受到错误信息的影响（Karanian 等人，美国国家科学院院刊）美利坚合众国，117，22771–22779，2020）。这种对错误信息的保护伴随着误导性试验期间与源编码（外侧 PFC）和冲突检测（ACC）相关的额叶区域的更大活动，以及听觉皮层和语义处理区域（左额下回）活动的全面减少。 ）涵盖事件后信息叙述的所有试验（一致、中立、误导）。重要的是，这些与警告相关的活动调节的强度与更好地防止最终记忆测试中的错误信息相关（提高了误导性试验的记忆准确性）。总之，这些结果表明，警告在暴露于错误信息期间调节与编码相关的神经活动，以提高记忆准确性。