Glossary
Source Confusion
What is source confusion?
Source confusion occurs when you remember information but attribute it to the wrong origin. This is a source misattribution or source-monitoring error. Did you read the statement, hear it from a friend, or imagine it? Remembering the content does not settle that question.
How it happens
The source-monitoring framework describes judgments about a memory's origin as inferences from features of the remembered experience. These judgments can be quick or deliberate, and either can be mistaken.
Example
You repeat an idea and believe you devised it, although you read it in a book earlier. That is cryptomnesia: a remembered idea experienced as new because its source has been lost.
You might also remember a colleague’s statement as something your manager said, or repeat a claim believing it came from a trusted publication when you actually saw it elsewhere. Both examples concern the remembered source, not necessarily whether the statement itself is true.
Why it matters
Familiarity is not a record of where information came from. The framework explains possible errors, including mistaken eyewitness identifications, but a particular memory still needs its own evidence.