the 1989 California earthquake. One group was located in a different state and only ‘heard’ about the quake, the second group experienced relatively minor effects in Berkeley located near the epicenter, and the third group resided in Santa Cruz, where major damage occurred. The participants answered a questionnaire soon after the earthquake experience and then another time one and a half years later. Although the participants who experienced the more severe conditions of the earthquake had a higher “mean remembered rating” than the other group located nearby, the results from this study show that memory was not necessarily better if high emotionality was involved in the context. The group of participants located in an entirely different state than the quake did even worse regarding the amount of recalled items. References Brown, R. & Kulik, J. (1997). “Flashbulb memories”, Cognition, 5(1), 73-99 Lanciano, T., Curci, A., & Semin, G.R. (2010). The Emotional and Reconstructive Determinants of Emotional Memories: An Experimental Approach to Flashbulb Memory Investigation. Memory, 18, 473-485. McCloskey, M., Wible, C. G. & Cohen, N. J. (1988). “Is there a special flashbulb-memory mechanism?”, Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 117, 171-181 Neisser, U. (2000) Snapshots or Benchmarks? In U. Neisser & I.E. Hyman (Eds.), Memory observed: remembering in natural contexts (2d ed.)(pp. 68–74). New York: Worth. Neisser, U. & Harsch, N. (1992). Phantom flashbulbs: False recollections of hearing the news about Challenger. In E. Winograd & U. Neisser (Eds.) Affect and accuracy in recall. New York: Cambridge University Press, 9-31. Neisser, U., Winograd, E., Bergman, E.T., Schreiber, C.A., Palmer, S.E., Weldon, M.S. (1996). Remembering the Earthquake: Direct Experience vs. Hearing the News. In U. Neisser & I.E. Hyman (Eds.), Memory observed: remembering in natural contexts (2d ed.)(pp. 90–104). New York: Worth. Psychological theories Memory