Remembering: A Study in Experimental and Social Psychology

In 1932, Cambridge University Press published Remembering, by the psychologist Frederic Bartlett. The landmark book described fascinating studies of memory and presented the theory of schema which informs much of cognitive science and psychology today. In Bartlett's most famous experiment, he had subjects read a Native American story about ghosts and had them retell the tale later. Because their backgrounds were so different from the cultural context of the story, the subjects changed details in the story that they could not understand. Besides containing important seminal concepts, Remembering is fascinating from an historical perspective. Bartlett discusses the ideas and research of Ebbinghaus, Freud, Jung, and Spearman. In addition, his comparison of Swazi African culture and British culture is a study in cross-cultural psychology that was ahead of its time.