CONFABULATION…WHAT IS THE TRUTH?

I wasn’t quite moved to discuss this topic until I was personally affected by it. Or rather, until I had a first hand experience of it. I had watched someone narrate what by all accounts never happened. I watched her tell a story I personally witnessed but added a few things I knew never happened. I watched her tell it with all convictions that I almost began to question the correctness of my own memory.

I wasn’t sure if I should say ‘No, it didn’t quite happen like that’ or ‘I thought it happened like this’. How do you politely refute someone’s claims without angering them? I simply watched with a striking surprise on my face as someone changed the script of an experience we shared; without my permission. I couldn’t boldly have called it a lie at the moment because the person had no reason to lie with the said topic, the story was a sincere one and she had said it with the strongest convictions, RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME.

It’s easier to understand when someone distorts the facts behind your back, because then you could boldly call the person a LIAR. But it’s different when he or she distorts it in your presence with a smile on their face, then you begin to wonder ‘When did all this happen?’. ‘Am I developing some sort of Amnesia?’ ‘Am I loosing some parts of my memory to food?’

Now, I don’t eat too much, so it couldn’t have been food. It’s not amnesia either as I have a very sharp memory. I still couldn’t quite explain it until I had another person to corroborate this experience. I guessed it could be ‘Confabulation’ therefore I decided to thoroughly research it to better understand the individual that motivated the thought.

Following the research of neuropsychologist John DeLuca, Ph.D., director of neuroscience research at the Kessler Medical Rehabilitation Research and Education Corporation in West Orange, New Jersey, Confabulation is defined as the spontaneous production of false memories: either memories for events which never occurred, or memories of actual events which are displaced in space or time. The patients confuse imagined scenarios with actual memories with no intent to deceive. Most cases of confabulation are the result of dementia, brain damage, aneurism or Wernicke-Korsakoff syndrome (thiamine deficiency due to alcoholism).

These memories may be elaborate and detailed. Some may be obviously bizarre, as a memory of a ride in an alien spaceship; others are quite mundane, as a memory of having eggs for breakfast, so that only a close family member can confirm that the memory is in fact false.

It is however important to note that people who confabulate stories are not lying: they are not deliberately trying to mislead, which is why it is sometimes referred to as ‘Honestly lying’. They are often very confident in their memories even after being shown contradicting evidence, like the experience I had with ‘the research motivator’.

Even when the stories are completely false, the person appears coherent, consistent and relatively normal. In fact, the patients are generally quite unaware that their memories are inaccurate, and they may argue strenuously that they have been telling the truth. Confabulation should not be confused with False Memory Syndrome- the phenomenon whereby otherwise normal individuals suddenly “remember” supposedly-repressed incidents of childhood abuse or other trauma.

The exact causes of confabulation are unknown, but basal forebrain damage may lead to memory impairments, while frontal damage may lead to problems in self-awareness. Thus, the patient may have a memory deficit but be unaware of his deficit.

Some of the treatment options are cognitive rehabilitation, in which you “relearn” cognitive skills. This could include learning to question the things someone is saying and consider answering “I’m not sure” or “I don’t know” instead of confabulating, keeping a diary, having a family member re-orient someone with confabulation to their surroundings. Most times, Confabulation resolves spontaneously with the passage of time.

This does not however excuse LIARS in any way. It could also be difficult to differentiate between people that confabulate and habitual liars, since the major difference is the presence of an intent to lie and intentions are not physical. Understanding the intentions and motives of people can help in the interpretation of communication. But that is a discussion for another day!

If you find yourself in a similar situation as I did, ask yourself these questions. Does the person have a reason to lie? Does he or she have anything to gain by lying? What is the seriousness of the topic being discussed? Does the person have a tone of honesty in this lie (Do they sound 100% convinced)? Does the individual have a habit of distorting facts no matter how little? After reading this article, you should be able to make your deductions.