Biography
Assistant Professor of Psychology and Public Affairs, Department of Psychology, Woodrow Wilson School for Public and International Affairs, Princeton University
ABSTRACT | Grounded Approach to the Formation of Collective Memories
The development of collective memories (i.e., shared individual memories that bear on people’s identities) is a fundamental characteristic of human communities. From groups as small as families and as large as nations, these memories are the result of a dynamical system that involves communicative interactions among individuals. People experience or learn about group-relevant events and then they communicate with one another about these events. In this talk, I will present empirical research on how cognitive, social, and structural factors influence the formation of collective memories. Implications for how nations come to remember their past will be discussed.