Does taking photos ruin your memory?

Soares and Storm report that “The photo-taking-impairment effect is observed when photographed information is less likely to be remembered than non-photographed information. Three experiments examined whether this effect persists when multiple photos are taken. Experiment 1 used a within-subjects laboratory-based design in which participants viewed images of paintings and were instructed to photograph them once, five times, or not at all. . . . and the photo-taking-impairment effect was observed when participants took multiple photos. [During] Experiment 2. . . . Participants either photographed all of the paintings they saw once, five times, or not at all. . . . The photo-taking-impairment effect was observed in both photo-taking conditions relative to the no photo baseline. Experiment 3 replicated this pattern of results even when participants who took multiple photos were instructed to take five unique photos. . . . the photo-taking-impairment effect is robust, occurring even when multiple photos are taken.”

Julia Soares and Benjamin Storm.  2022. “Does Taking Multiple Photos Lead to a Photo-Taking-Impairment Effect.” Psychonomic Bulletin and Review, vol. 29, pp. 2211-2218, https://doi.org/10.3758/s13423-022-02149-2