‘Rosy Retrospection’ Bias And How Your Mind Tricks You Into Thinking The Past Was Better

by Brent Roy

Rosy retrospection makes us think of the past fondly. But that’s not always a good thing.

When my two oldest boys came home for Christmas a couple of years ago, one of their girlfriends asked to see childhood videos. I obliged, somewhat reluctantly.

I popped an aged VHS tape labeled “Matt & Gabe — April 1997” into the VCR that’s, shockingly, still functioning and properly connected to our television.

Me, with my two sons, Matt and Gabe. Circa 1999

What if it contained unhappy memories? Suddenly, my grown sons were two and five again, with their waggish smiles and engaged in innocent brotherly banter.

How I wanted to be back in that moment, to whisk them up by the back of their Oshkosh B’gosh denim overalls and fly them like little airplanes around the room, a son on each side!

These weren’t unhappy memories at all! It was a perfect time. They were perfect sons. We were a perfect family! Except, we weren’t.

Rosy retrospection bias tricks you into believing that the past was a better time

Rosy retrospection is a cognitive bias that causes people to remember past events as being more positive than they really were. Meanwhile, we remember the present as being worse than the way things used to be.

It’s very common to see this in full display in the comments section of classic songs on YouTube.

The other day I found myself listening to “Biggest Part of Me” by Ambrosia and reading this recollection from another rosy retrospectionist.

“These were the times when life made sense. You went through the normal loving, dating, breaking up, getting over it, and moving on. Having a family enjoying the neighbors. Nothing like now. The music was so soothing and so much fun!”

Another commenter recalls it this way: “I graduated from high school when the song first came out. The 80s were my decade. Every day was a sunny day.”

Rosy retrospection bias and abstract thinking

The reason we perceive the past more fondly is that we are more likely to think about past events, places, people, and things in the abstract.

If our perception of the past is biased, it can lead to the distortion of our view of the present and negatively paint our expectations for the future.

If we’re able to expand our individual perspective to a broader one, we can more objectively understand that our mind has been playing tricks on us.

While we swooned to Ambrosia on the high-school dance floor, serious world events were taking place.

In 1980, the inflation rate in the U.S. was 13.58 percent, the Iran-Iraq war started, Mount St. Helens erupted, killing 57 people, a summer heatwave in the southern U.S. resulted in over 1,100 deaths in 20 states, and John Lennon was shot dead in New York City.

Unless these events directly affected us somehow, they are unlikely to play much of a role in our personal reminiscences.

It’s all about how your brain processes memories over time

Older adults tend to look back fondly on the 20-year period of life starting at about age 10 or 11. This is when a lot of significant life events tend to occur within that timeframe.

First kisses and crushes, high school and college graduations, reunions, proposals, weddings, and starting a family — these are all common nostalgic events that typically happen within those two magical decades.

That’s also when you’re saturated in hormones and dopamine and less averse to risk, affecting your decisions and resulting in more memorable events.

Your brain is more adept at remembering how you felt during those times than the precise details of what you did.

We cannot fully trust our memory

Rosy retrospection bias is a reminder that you cannot fully trust the contents of your vivid recollections. If you want to avoid your brain tricking you, it pays to examine our personal evaluations and assumptions about things.

I tend to agree that the music in 1980 was “so soothing and so much fun” but I was a teenager then. Music played a big part in the creation of my personal memories.

Now, I really don’t pay much attention to today’s music. Yet, I’m sure it’s instrumental to the memory-making process of today’s youth. It’s helpful to understand that older adults just aren’t making memories like they used to!

So, as I consider more objectively the “Matt & Gabe – April 1997” VHS tape, I know life wasn’t really better than it is now. I still say it was great, but so is today.

No, it wasn’t a perfect time and we weren’t a perfect family.

The boys fought with one another, their mother and I made mistakes, toys broke, fun events were canceled… And yet, none of these were captured on video.

They are only, loosely, in our memories.