Sound Evoked Visual Memory in Narrative Film

Abstract

In film important narrative events are sometimes presented by sound alone, leading some audiences to remember seeing events that were not presented visually. Audiences construct a representation of the narrative based on information supplied by the film, integrated with knowledge derived from stored memory schemas, for later recall. However, the ability of off-screen sound to evoke visual memories of unseen narrative events has never been empirically tested in a real-world setting. We played audiences (adults in Singapore and online) two experimentally manipulated versions of a narrative film in which different events were depicted on screen or by sound alone. In a recall test, audiences reported high confidence for having viewed some events that were only presented with sound. Confidence for seen/unseen events differed according to their narrative salience, and audience empathy played a role. These findings are the first demonstration of the psychologically real sound-evoked visual memory in film audiences.