The Berenstain Bears Mandela Effect Has New Yorkers Talking

The Mandela Effect is a term that describes the shared experience among a large group of people remembering something differently from how it actually occurred or existed in the past.

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In New York, no matter how hard we try, we just can't wrap our heads around the "Berenstain Bears" being the correct spelling of our childhood books.

The term the "Mandela Effect" was coined by a paranormal enthusiast named Fiona Broome in 2009 after she discovered that many people believed that Nelson Mandela died in prison in the 1980s when the truth is that he was released in 1990 and died in 2013.

According to recent search data, the most popular Mandela Effect in New York is the debate surrounding the spelling of a book that many of us read as children created by Stan and Jan Berenstain. Many people swear that the books were spelled "Berenstein Bears", with an "e" instead of an "a", and are shocked to learn that the correct spelling is actually "Berenstain Bears."

While nobody knows exactly what causes the Mandela Effect some researchers think that it is a result of false memories while others believe it could be a form of a parallel universe or alternate reality.

Other examples of the Mandela Effect include people remembering that the Monopoly Man wears a monocle when he doesn't and that the fictional character Curious George has a tail when he doesn't.

The Mandela Effect is intriguing and certainly leads to some interesting debates over the "Berenstain" vs. "Berenstein" spelling of the bear family books among New Yorkers!