Longing for the ‘good old days’? Before the EU ‘ruined’ the UK? If so, you may have a memory bias.

I'm a scientist who studies false memory. In my research I convince people that they experienced complex and highly emotional events that never happened.

Let me explain how false memories can threaten effective political decision-making.

EU kiss-a-thon for UK to stay

Politicians like Nigel Farage, Boris Johnson, and Donald Trump, like to use a rhetoric that emphasises how much better things were before the UK joined the EU (or the ‘European Community’ as it was known at the time). They like to remind us of the ‘good old days’, before pesky migrants, international human rights and elaborate trade deals. They tell us that they want to make our countries great again.

But our countries are already great, certainly when compared to the UK’s pre-EU past. ‘Leave’ campaigners seem to have forgotten how not-so-good the old days actually were.

It seems that many of the ‘leave’ campaign’s arguments are based on a misremembered nostalgia. They seem to forget that before the UK joined the EU, people died younger, employers discriminated freely, European countries regularly went to war, and of course, the whole country ate terrible food.

Instead of assuming that the nostalgia peddled by the Leave campaigners is malicious or manipulative, I posit that it may be the result of false memory.

The most scaremongering arguments for Brexit Show all 7 1 /7 The most scaremongering arguments for Brexit The most scaremongering arguments for Brexit 22 May 2015 In his regular column in The Express Nigel Farage utilised the concerns over Putin and the EU to deliver a tongue in cheek conclusion. “With friends like these, who needs enemies?” PA The most scaremongering arguments for Brexit 13 November 2015 UKIP MEP for Yorkshire and North Lincolnshire Mike Hookem, was one of several political figures who took no time to harness the toxic atmosphere just moments after Paris attacks to push an agenda. “Cameron says we’re safer in the EU. Well I’m in the centre of the EU and it doesn’t feel very safe.” Getty Images The most scaremongering arguments for Brexit 19 April 2016 In an article written for The Guardian, Michael Gove attempts to bolster his argument with a highly charged metaphor in which he likens UK remaining in the EU to a hostage situation. “We’re voting to be hostages locked in the back of the car and driven headlong towards deeper EU integration.” Rex The most scaremongering arguments for Brexit 26 April 2016 In a move that is hard to decipher, let alone understand, Mike Hookem stuck it to Obama re-tweeting a UKIP advertisement that utilises a quote from the film: ‘Love Actually’ to dishonour the US stance on the EU. “A friend who bullies us is no longer a friend” The most scaremongering arguments for Brexit 10 May 2016 During a speech in London former work and pensions secretary Ian Duncan Smith said that EU migration would cause an increasing divide between people who benefit from immigration and people who couldn’t not find work because of uncontrolled migration. “The European Union is a ‘force for social injustice’ which backs the ‘haves rather than the have-nots.” EPA The most scaremongering arguments for Brexit 15 May 2016 Cartoon character Boris Johnson made the news again over controversial comments that the EU had the same goal as Hitler in trying to create a political super state. “Napoleon, Hitler, various people tried this out, and it ends tragically.” “The EU is an attempt to do this by different methods.” PA The most scaremongering arguments for Brexit 16 May 2016 During a tour of the women’s clothing manufacturer David Nieper, Boris had ample time to cook up a new metaphor, arguably eclipsing Gove’s in which he compares the EU to ‘badly designed undergarments.’ “So I just say to all those who prophecy doom and gloom for the British Business, I say their pants are on fire. Let’s say knickers to the pessimists, knickers to all those who talk Britain down.” Getty Images

More specifically, these political pundits may have what scientists refer to as ‘rosy retrospection’. This is our “tendency to remember and recollect events more fondly and positively than they were at the time of the experience”. Rosy retrospection means that some of us are likely to have memories of our country’s past that make it seem better than it actually was.

But, why? Research has shown that people 40+ generally have a ‘reminiscence bump’. The reminiscence bump means that, in the long run, we remember our adolescence and early twenties better than any other periods of our lives.

It means that if you were in your reminiscence bump before the UK joined the EU in 1973, or before some of the consequences of joining were implemented, you are at risk of remembering these times more fondly and in more detail than they actually were.

When you are standing at the polls contemplating your referendum decision, don’t let your nostalgia bias sway you. Instead, look at the objective evidence as to what is best for Britain.

Dr Julia Shaw works at London South Bank University in the department of Law and Social Sciences. She is a senior lecturer, researcher, and author of "The Memory Illusion: Remembering, Forgetting, and the Science of False Memory”.