Major EU project led by UCC to investigate false memories

4 Sep 2025

• UCC researcher Dr Gillian Murphy awarded €1.5m European Research Council Starting Grant to explore false memories.
• Researchers will examine the possibility that false memories are reliable, adaptive and highly functional.
• The five-year research project will investigate the potential upsides of memory distortion – something typically viewed in a negative light - and explore the ethics of intentional alteration of memories.

A major project has received significant European Union (EU) funding to investigate false memories and challenge widespread theories about the flaws of memory.

Led by University College Cork (UCC) researcher Dr Gillian Murphy, the project will test a bold idea: that the human tendency to form false memories is not a mere side effect of our flexible memory systems, but may serve useful purposes depending on the situation and the person.

Understanding why our memories work as they do

For decades, research has shown that personal memories aren’t fixed, memories can shift and change over time. A simple conversation can reshape memories or plant memories of events that never happened. These distortions can carry serious consequences, and flawed eyewitness testimony is the leading cause of wrongful convictions. Now, UCC researchers will examine whether the construction of false memories can in fact serve useful adaptive purposes, such as improving wellbeing or strengthening social cohesion.

Dr Gillian Murphy has been awarded a highly competitive €1.5m European Research Council (ERC) Starting Grant to lead the project entitled Functional, Reliable and Adaptive Memory Errors (FRAME).  

Dr Gillian Murphy, Senior Lecturer in Applied Psychology at UCC and a Funded Investigator at Lero, the Research Ireland Centre for Software, said: “Our memories make us who we are. Understanding why our memories work as they do – apparent “flaws” and all – is a critical and urgent question with implications for every human-related field of study, requiring a groundbreaking leap forward.”

“Memories are prone to distortion, and this is often viewed negatively. However, memory did not evolve to act as a recording device. It evolved under the same selective pressures as anything else in the natural world - survival and reproduction,” Dr Murphy said.

A paradigm-shift in the way we think about human memory

“Cognitive psychologists tend to be preoccupied with memory accuracy, such that deviations from accuracy are referred to in our theoretical memory models as errors, distortions, and failures. FRAME represents a radical new approach, where we will experimentally test memory in unconventional ways to explore the potential benefits of false memories. Empirical evidence for this functional account of false memories would represent a paradigm-shift in the way we think about human memory, reframing our flaws as features,” Dr Murphy said.

FRAME will test how memory malleability may allow people to be happier in themselves and to integrate more effectively within social groups, but also how memory accuracy may be prioritised for survival-related information. FRAME will also explore how people can investigate and harness functional false memories in an ethical way and will culminate in a new model of false memories.

ERC Starting Grants support cutting-edge research in a wide range of fields, from life sciences and physical sciences to social sciences and humanities. The grants are aimed at early-career researchers who have demonstrated significant potential, enabling principal investigators (PIs) to establish their own teams and advance pioneering research.  

Congratulating Dr Gillian Murphy, Professor John F. Cryan, UCC Vice President for Research and Innovation said: "Congratulations to Gillian on securing this highly competitive and prestigious ERC Award. The FRAME project represents an innovative and pioneering new direction in memory research, and I welcome the opportunities that this award will offer Gillian and her team to further develop the impact of their groundbreaking work."