Joy English · Level C1 · Psychologyjoy-english.com
Why we overestimate our own memory
Name:Date:
Follow an abstract argument with a concession and a contrast.
Listen to each sentence and write what you hear.
Audio and answer checking: https://joy-english.com/listening-lessons/why-we-overestimate-our-own-memory
Words to know
- recollection
- Something that you remember.
- reconstruct
- To build again from parts.
- vivid
- Very clear and detailed.
- accuracy
- The quality of being correct.
Answer key
- Most people believe their memories work like recordings, yet research suggests that each recollection is partly rebuilt.'Recollection' has stress on the third syllable: rec-ol-LEC-tion. 'Yet' here means but.
- Every time you recall an event, the brain reconstructs it, and small errors can quietly slip in.'Every' is often two syllables: EV-ry. 'Reconstructs it' links as 'reconstructs-it'.
- Confidence, strikingly, is a poor guide to accuracy; vivid memories are often the ones that contain mistakes.'Strikingly' is an adverb that comments on the whole sentence. 'Accuracy' is stressed on the first syllable: AC-cu-ra-cy.
- This does not mean memory is useless, only that it serves the present more than it preserves the past.'Only that' limits the idea. 'Serves' and 'preserves' end with a z sound.
- So, when two witnesses disagree, the sensible conclusion is rarely that one of them is lying.'Rarely that' means it is not usually true that. 'One of them' links as 'one-of-them'.