ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on cultural issues in Flashbulb memory (FBM), and analyzes memory for public news events. Research considering mass media and information transmission as a macro-level influence of culture on FBM is sparse and should be a fruitful area in future research. Especially in this technology era, new means of information transmission such as websites, social media, emails, and text messages have become increasingly important ways through which individuals seek and receive public event news. Research on FBM has identified critical factors that affect the quality and preservation of memories. These factors include encoding variables such as surprise, intense emotionality, and consequentiality of the original event as perceived by the individual and social group, which may trigger special encoding mechanisms to make the subsequent memory representations vivid and long lasting. The facilitative effect of emotion on FBM cannot be reduced to a state of arousal or a mere subjective feeling state, but must be situated in a cultural context.
