Here’s why you and your partner remember the same argument differently
Going in circles about what really happened is exhausting. But science says there’s a perfectly logical reason why that’s happening.
You are absolutely sure that during that vacation, you were the one trying to save the mood. Your partner, in turn, is absolutely sure that you were actually the one who spent the entire car ride sulking and staring out the window. That is how an innocent look back at a weekend away can suddenly turn into a discussion about who is really right. Plot twist: maybe you are both right. So why do we remember events so differently? (Also, this isn’t to be confused with a partner genuinely gaslighting you, aka intentionally twisting or denying the exchange as a way to manipulate you). We tapped a psychiatrist who has a few thoughts.
Our memory reconstructs memories every time
Many people think that memories are stored somewhere in our heads like a ready-made film that we can replay. But according to psychiatrist Boris van Passel, that is not how it works. "Our memory is not a video recorder," he explains. "We reconstruct memories every time from all kinds of fragments of information that are available at that moment."
As a result, two people can experience the same event and later each be left with a different memory of it. Take a couple who had an argument during a vacation. One mainly remembers the stressful car ride, while the other mainly remembers the criticism about the route. Both memories can be sincere, even if they differ from each other.
Why do we remember things differently?
According to Van Passel, three factors are broadly involved: our thoughts, emotions, and the context in which we experience or recall something.
1. Your mood determines which memories come to the surface
How you feel when you think back to something largely determines which details you retrieve. "If you are angry with your partner, you bring up different details than when you are curious or forgiving," says Van Passel. "The search query partly determines the outcome."
Our brains also divide events into different chapters. Which of those receive a lot of attention and which fade into the background varies from person to person.
The psychiatrist sees this in his practice as well. People with anxiety or obsessive-compulsive symptoms often focus strongly on the moments when something seemed to go wrong. The twenty moments when everything simply went just fine? Those often disappear from view remarkably quickly.
2. Emotions color our memories
Strong emotions during an event can make some details razor-sharp, while others almost disappear. Van Passel tells of a patient who was convinced that he was constantly looking out the window during their conversations. He himself could not remember that.
"That does not mean her memory was untrue," he says. "She was someone who was very afraid of being found boring or uninteresting."
Maybe he looked outside a few times to think or because something was happening outside. He had no strong emotions at that moment. For the patient, that may have felt like confirmation of her fear (a strong emotion) that her story was not interesting enough.
"That is not lying or unwillingness," Van Passel emphasizes. "Emotions simply color what we notice and remember."
3. The environment also plays a role
In addition, context influences our memory. Where you are, who you are with, and even smells or sounds can determine which memories come to the surface.
That explains why people are sometimes suddenly flooded with memories as soon as they return to a particular place. The environment, as it were, reactivates parts of the story.
How do parallel truths arise?
In a relationship, all those factors come together. Partners pay attention to different things, experience different emotions, and later think back to the same event from a different context. Van Passel sometimes calls these "parallel truths".
He gives an example from his own work. His consultation hours regularly run over, and patients respond to that in different ways. Some get angry because they have to wait. Others see it as a sign that he takes the time for people who need it. The fact remains the same; the interpretation differs.
Who is right?
If two people remember events differently, who is right? According to Van Passel, that is often the wrong question. He remembers a couple in which the woman felt that her partner never helped with the children. The man, on the other hand, was convinced that he was always there to help, except for one evening when he had to work.
Both genuinely believed that their memory was accurate. Only when they looked very specifically at individual moments did it turn out that their stories overlapped much more than they themselves thought.
Partners sometimes hope that a therapist can determine who is right, but according to Van Passel, that usually does not help a relationship move forward. "It is much more useful when people become curious about how the other person arrives at his or her memory, emotions, and conclusions."
Memory is about meaning
The most important lesson? Our brain is less focused on factual truth than we often think. "Memory is not so much a truth system as a meaning system," says Van Passel.
"It does not record reality the way a camera does, but turns it into a story that fits what we felt, thought, and considered important." Van Passel concludes: "That makes us human, but sometimes also susceptible to misunderstandings."
Credit: Cosmopolitan