S10 E4: The science of memory and misinformation, with David Rapp, Ph.D.

Nov 5, 2025

David N. Rapp, Ph.D., a Professor at Northwestern University, explores the intricate relationship between memory and comprehension. He explains how comprehension involves both cognitive processes and memory retention. Rapp emphasizes the dangers of misinformation and its long-lasting effects on learning. He discusses strategies to combat incorrect memories, highlighting the importance of media literacy and source evaluation for young learners. Rapp’s insights shed light on how accurate knowledge can be built through comparing multiple sources.

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INSIGHT

Process Versus Product

Comprehension is both the active cognitive processes during reading and the product that remains afterward.
Researchers can observe products easily but must design clever methods to infer in-the-moment processes.

INSIGHT

Comprehension Is Higher-Order

Comprehension is a higher-order cognitive activity requiring many coordinated processes like attention and inference.
It feels easy after years of practice but relies on complex operations behind the scenes.

INSIGHT

Two Sides Of Coherence

Coherence can describe text flow or the internal organization of someone's knowledge.
Coherent knowledge lets you make inferences quickly, but coherent beliefs can still be incorrect.

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In this episode of Science of Reading: The Podcast, Susan Lambert is joined by Northwestern University Professor of Education, Social Policy, and Psychology David Rapp. David’s research focuses on language and memory, and his conversation with Susan gives insight into how memory is connected to comprehension. The first half of the episode is spent defining comprehension as a process, a product, and a higher-order cognitive process. David then digs into how that definition informs the ways in which educators assess comprehension and where they can look for potential failure points. One of these failure points includes misinformation. David addresses what happens when misinformation is stored in long-term memory. He details the issues this can cause for student comprehension, and he gives guidance on how to prevent and correct them.

Show notes:

Submit your questions on comprehension!
Access free, high-quality resources at our brand new, companion professional learning page.
Check out David Rapp's lab.
Resources:
- Listen to Season 2 of Amplify’s Beyond My Years podcast.
Join our community Facebook group.
Connect with Susan Lambert.

Quotes:

“Once the information is in memory, you can't really get rid of it. What you can try to do is make other memories more powerful, more likely to resonate to things.” —David Rapp, Ph.D.

“Sometimes our most effective processes actually lead us to misunderstand. For example, you're really good at encoding information to memory, that's great, except if you're exposed to inaccurate ideas, that's a problem.” —David Rapp, Ph.D.

“It feels easy for us to comprehend texts if we're well practiced at it, it feels easy, but it's actually a lot of cognitive operations going on behind the scenes and a lot of years of practice.” —David Rapp, Ph.D.

“In terms of being exposed to misinformation, we see even if people have been exposed to inaccurate ideas, even once, it's encoded into memory, it's potentially gonna be there to influence you.” —David Rapp, Ph.D.

Episode Timestamps
02:00 Introduction: Who is David Rapp?
04:00 Defining reading comprehension
05:00 Comprehension as a process vs a product
08:00 Comprehension as a higher order cognitive process
12:00 Coherence
18:00 Memory activation and misinformation
21:00 Consequences of misinformation
25:00 Correcting misinformation
28:00 Preventing misinformation
36:00 The evolution of thinking on comprehension
40:00 Current research
45:00 Closing thoughts and encouragement to dig into research
*Timestamps are approximate, rounded to nearest minute