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Memory for trauma: Is it “special”?
Dr James Ost
Department of Psychology,
University of Portsmouth, UK
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Outline of presentation
1. Post-traumatic stress disorder and memory.
2. Classic laboratory research on arousal and
memory.
3. The ‘memory wars’.
4. Do we forget traumatic / personally significant
events?
5. Do we misremember traumatic / personally
significant events?
6. Conclusion: Is memory for traumatic events
“special”?
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1. Post-traumatic stress disorder
(PTSD) and memory.
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PTSD and memory
• Acute (e.g. short term) stress symptoms (e.g.
“shellshock”, “battle fatigue”) were thought to
subside once soldiers returned from battle.
• Following the Vietnam War, some US psychiatrists
argued that stress symptoms could persist for a
long time (chronic) and could develop later in
soldiers who appeared initially unaffected
(delayed effects).
McNally (2011, pp. 146-156)
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PTSD and memory
• But there was no diagnosis in the Diagnostic and
Statistical Manual (DSM) of the American
Psychiatric Association that covered chronic or
delayed symptoms.
• Lobbyists argued that a ‘post Vietnam’ syndrome
should be included in the DSM, in order that such
individuals could receive appropriate medical
help, but this was rejected.
McNally (2011, pp. 146-156)
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PTSD and memory
• Lobbyists then argued that the same stress
syndrome (chronic, delayed etc.) occurred in
survivors of other traumatic events (e.g. rape,
natural disasters, torture, accidents, confinement
in concentration camps).
• As a result Post-traumatic Stress Disorder was
included the third edition of the DSM in 1980.
McNally (2011, pp. 146-156)
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PTSD and memory
• The DSM-III definition specified exposure to a traumatic stressor as a
causal feature in the development of PTSD.
• This stressor had to:
• “evoke significant symptoms of distress in almost everyone” and had to
be “outside the usual range of human experience.”
• Three clusters of symptoms were caused by exposure to the stressor:
– A) “re-experiencing symptoms” (e.g. flashbacks, nightmares)
– B) “numbing symptoms” (e.g. blunted emotions, loss of interest)
– C) “miscellaneous symptoms” (e.g. hypervigilance for the threat,
enhanced startle response, sleep disturbance, survivor guilt, “memory
and concentration impairment, everyday forgetfulness”)
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PTSD and memory
• However, between the original inclusion of PTSD in the DSM-III
(1980), and its subsequent revisions in DSM-III(R) (1987), DSM-IV
(1994) and DSM V (2013) something strange happened to the
notion of “memory” in PTSD diagnoses.
– “memory and concentration impairment, everyday
forgetfulness” (DSM-III) were replaced with
– “an inability to recall an important aspect of the trauma
(psychogenic amnesia)” (DSM-IIIR, IV & V)
• “This was a radical change. No longer was PTSD about having
excruciatingly vivid memories of trauma; it was now about inability
to remember certain parts of the trauma.” (McNally, 2003, p. 10,
emphasis added).
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PTSD and memory
• This is difficult to reconcile with the other defining
symptoms of PTSD, including (DSM V, p. 271):
1.
2.
3.
Recurrent, involuntary, and intrusive distressing memories of
the traumatic event(s);
Recurrent distressing dreams in which the content and/or
affect of the dream are related to the traumatic event(s);
Dissociative reactions (e.g., flashbacks) in which the individual
feels of acts as if the traumatic event(s) were recurring.
• A paradox? In order to meet PTSD criteria you need to
simultaneously remember, and be unable to remember, the
traumatic stressor?
• We will return to this issue later in the talk.
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2. Laboratory research on arousal
and memory.
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Arousal and memory
• The effects of arousal on memory have been
studied in laboratory experiments mainly to help
understand how it might impact eyewitness
testimony.
• For example: the Weapon Focus effect.
• Deffenbacher et al.’s (2004) meta-analysis
revealed that heightened anxiety and stress had
generally negative effects on witness memory
(e.g., poorer identification of perpetrators, fewer
details of crime scenes).
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Arousal and memory
• However, this finding is not conclusive.
• For example, McKinnon et al. (2014) study of
passengers (incl. the first author of the paper) on
a plane that nearly had to ditch into the sea.
• Most details remembered fairly well.
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Exercise: Where were you on … ?
7th July 2005?
?
11th March 2011?
?
7th January 2015
?
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Exercise: Where were you on … ?
7th July 2005?
Terrorist attacks in
London.
11th March 2011?
Earthquake and
subsequent tsunami
in north eastern
Japan
7th
Attacks on the offices
of Charlie Hebdo
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Flashbulb memories
• Vivid, long-lasting autobiographical events for
important, dramatic or surprising public events
(e.g., where were you when you heard the news
about 9/11?)
• Are memories for these kinds of events different
from memories of non-flashbulb events?
• Yes – a special neural mechanism (Brown & Kulik, 1977)
• No – depend on factors involved in the formation
of any new memory (Finkenauer et al., 1988)
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Flashbulb memories
Flashbulb memories of the surprise resignation of British Prime
Minister found in 86% of British participants after 11 months, and
remained consistent after 26 months (Conway et al., 1994).
Consistency of memories of 9/11 was fairly high, even after long
delays (Kvavilashvili et al., 2009)
But flashbulb memories are not always consistent over time.
George Bush is on record at least three times recounting how
he heard the news of the attacks on 9/11. His answers contain
substantial inconsistencies (Greenberg, 2004). We will return
to this example later.
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Are flashbulb memories “special”?
Students’ memories of the events of 9/11 and an ‘everyday’ event were
recorded on 12th September 2001 and then tested again either 1, 6 or 32
weeks later.
Memories changed considerably over the first few days before becoming
consistent (therefore flashbulb memories weren’t fully formed at the
moment people learned of the events of 9/11, as predicted by the Brown &
Kulik (1977) model).
Furthermore although both 9/11 and ‘everyday’ event memories decreased
equally in consistency, recollection and belief in accuracy over time, the
reported vividness of 9/11 memories did not.
Thus memories for these flashbulb-type events were no more accurate or
consistent than memories for non-flashbulb events, people simply perceived
that they were.
Talarico and Rubin (2003)
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Are flashbulb memories “special”?
And people can be misled about them, like any other memory.
For example, having read a leading question, 44% of
participants in one study claimed to have seen a film of the
moment that the car carrying Princess Diana, Dodi Fayed and
their driver crashed in Paris (Ost, Vrij, Costall & Bull, 2002)
We will return to more of these examples later.
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PTSD, arousal and memory: Summary
• The clinical and laboratory literatures do not
produce conclusive findings (likely due to
differences in methodology, personal meaning
of the events and so on).
• So what is the answer? Is traumatic memory
“special”? Do we need different theories to
account for the way that traumatic events are
remembered (or not remembered)?
(Shobe & Kihlstrom, 1997)
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The question of the relationship
between trauma and memory
became highly politicized as a
result of two separate sets of
events that gave rise to what is
now known as the ‘memory wars’
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3. The ‘memory wars’
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1) Daycare centre cases in North America
• Allegations of abuse in daycare centres in USA (e.g.
McMartin preschool case etc.)
• Use of inappropriate interviewing techniques (Garven,
Wood, Malpass & Shaw, 1998)
• The bottom line of course is that, if any of the children
had been abused, then no way of telling because of the
inappropriate ways in which they were interviewed.
• Click here to watch a 13 minute video here about this
case: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2R21tWs-qCw
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2) ‘Recovered’ memories in therapy
• In the late 1980s and early 1990s there was a rise in
people claiming to have suddenly ‘recovered’ long lost
memories of childhood sexual abuse sometimes, but not
always, following a period of psychotherapy.
• One of the most contentious debates in the history of
psychology.
• Click here to watch a nine minute video presenting both
sides of the recovered memory debate:
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VcFRZsD8DLk
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2) ‘Recovered’ memories in therapy
• On one side were those who argued that these memories
were often genuine and had blocked from conscious
awareness by processes known as repression or dissociative
amnesia.
– “… the nature of traumatic dissociative amnesia is such
that it is not subject to the same rules of ordinary
forgetting; it is more, rather than less, common after
repeated episodes; involves strong affect; and is resistant
to retrieval through salient cues.” (Spiegel, 1997, p. 6)
– “half of all incest survivors do not remember that the
abuse occurred” (Blume, 1990, p. 81)
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2) ‘Recovered’ memories in therapy
• On the other side were those who argued that these claims
were problematic, citing the reconstructive nature of memory.
– “… the mind does not operate like a videotape recorder.
When we call an episode from our past, we reconstruct it
from elements distributed throughout the brain.
Recollection is always reconstruction. It is not a matter of
reloading a videotape for replay in the mind’s eye.
Memory for trauma is not exempt from this principle.”
(McNally, 2005, p. 818)
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We will now look briefly at the
evidence for both of these
arguments.
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4. Do we repress or dissociate
traumatic / personally significant
events?
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Freud and repression
• Repression is a mechanism, proposed by Freud, where
unwanted or threatening thoughts and impulses are
consciously or unconsciously pushed into the subconscious
mind.
• However, the repression was always – at least partially –
unsuccessful and evidence of the unwanted thoughts leaked
through into consciousness, sometimes in the form of dreams
or other behaviours (e.g., Freudian slips).
• These ‘leaks’ were then interpreted by the psychoanalyst as
evidence of memories of trauma for which the patient was
presently unaware or unable to recall.
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An important distinction
• Repression (a.k.a. “massive repression” or “repression
proper”)
unconsciously ‘blocking out’ memories
= problematic in cognitive psychological literature
• Suppression
intentionally ‘blocking out’ memories (i.e., trying not to think
about something)
= accepted in cognitive psychological literature
• In this talk I will be referring to the ‘unconscious’ form of
repression – that even if one tried to remember, one would be
unable to do so.
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Freud and repression
• No clear evidence that it occurs.
• One of the most rigorous studies was by Goodman et al.
(2003)
• Interviewed 175 individuals with documented abuse histories
(had occurred 15+ years ago)
• Found that 81% of sample reported the documented abuse
(increased to 92% after interviews)
• Furthermore, several factors were associated with a higher
likelihood of disclosure:
– 1) older age when the abuse ended
– 2) maternal support following initial disclosure of abuse
– 3) more severe abuse
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Freud and repression
• Massive (i.e., unconscious) repression is very
controversial.
• There is little evidence that it occurs (although it
is impossible to prove a negative).
• Studies of survivors of repeated or one-off
traumatic events typically show that people in
fact have trouble forgetting those events.
• Early studies that were interpreted as evidence of
repression were either methodologically flawed,
or had been misunderstood / misinterpreted
(McNally, 2005).
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Janet and dissociation
• Pierre Janet proposed that traumatic events lead a
person’s conscious mind to ‘fragment’.
• These fragments served to ‘house’ the memory of the
trauma and keep it away from consciousness via a
mechanism known as dissociative amnesia.
• It was argued that this dissociation could become so
extensive that it could lead to multiple personality
disorder (which was renamed in 1994 to dissociative
identity disorder) in which patients develop entire
‘alter’ personalities to cope with the trauma they had
experienced.
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Janet and dissociation
• Dissociative Identity Disorder is another hugely
controversial disorder (and the term ‘dissociation’ is vague
and used inconsistently).
• Key case of Sybil thoroughly debunked (Nathan, 2011)
• Although it is in the DSM, debate centres on whether
Dissociative Identity Disorder develops as a result of
childhood trauma or as the result of suggestive therapy
where patients are encouraged to ‘act as if they are other
people’ in order to receive treatment.
• Furthermore, laboratory studies show that people with a
diagnosis of dissociative identity disorder are aware of
information held by ‘alter’ personalities, even if they claim
not to be (so no convincing evidence of dissociative
amnesia between ‘alter’ personalities).
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Freyd and betrayal trauma theory
• Freyd (1994) suggests that abused children develop a
coping mechanism to deal specifically with the
experience of being abused.
• The logic of the theory …
• Child relies on caregiver for food, shelter etc.
• If caregiver is abusing child then child’s natural
reaction would be to withdraw from that relationship
• However, this would mean the child would also lose
the food, shelter etc.
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Freyd and betrayal trauma theory
• To cope with this paradox, Freyd argues, the child
learns to forget the traumatic experiences are
occurring (refers to ‘knowledge isolation’).
• … in order to maintain the link with the caregiver
• Lacks convincing evidence to support it as yet – an
abused child does not necessarily need to forget that
abuse is happening – they just need to not talk about
it (McNally, 2007)
• Although some evidence that closer relationship to
abuser does seem to predict longer disclosure times
(Foynes, Freyd, & DePrince, 2009)
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Are “special” forgetting mechanisms needed?
• McNally (2012) argues that what looks like
repression, dissociative amnesia or knowledge
isolation in betrayal trauma theory can in fact
be explained by established cognitive
psychological theories of memory.
• If this is the case, then there is no need to
propose “special” forgetting mechanisms like
repression or dissociative amnesia.
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Are “special” forgetting mechanisms needed?
• Confusing repression / dissociative amnesia with other
phenomena, for example:
• Confusing posttraumatic forgetfulness with an inability to
remember the trauma itself
• Confusing impaired encoding with amnesia for the trauma
• Confusing organic amnesia for repression of trauma
• Confusing nondisclosure with repression of trauma
• Confusing childhood amnesia with repression of trauma
• Confusing not thinking about abuse with repression of
trauma
McNally (2012)
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5. Do we misremember traumatic
/ personally significant events?
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For example …
"I remember landing under sniper fire. There was supposed to be some kind of a
greeting ceremony at the airport, but instead we just ran with our heads down to get
into the vehicles to get to our base.”
Hillary Clinton, speech at George Washington University, March 17, 2008.
For a two minute YouTube clip click here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8BfNqhV5hg4
“ … when we walked into the classroom, I had seen this plane fly into the first building
… and you know, I thought it was pilot error … anyway, I’m sitting there, listening to
the briefing, and Andy Card came and said, ‘America is under attack’.”
George Bush, recounting his reaction to the news of the attacks of 9/11, California, 2002
Greenberg (2004, p. 364)
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Memory is not a video-recorder
• And this is not hugely surprising – memory is
not an accurate “recording” of events that can
be played back on demand.
• It is our interpretation of events, not a literal
record of what happened.
• As you will already have seen on this course, a
huge variety of factors influence the reliability
of memory evidence.
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Crashing memories
• Crombag, Wagenaar & Van Koppen (1996) memories of a plane
crash in Amsterdam.
• Study 1 = 45% (87/193) claimed to have seen the film and
provided further details about how long it took for fire to break
out.
• Study 2 = 66% claimed to have seen the film and provided
further details such as
– (i) the angle the plane hit the block of flats
– (ii) how long it took before fire broke out
– (iii) how long it took for the emergency services to arrive
• One problem … no film existed of the moment of impact.
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Crashing memories replicated
• Car crash in which Princess Diana, Dodi Fayed and their driver
were killed (44%, Ost, Vrij, Costall & Bull, 2002)
• Videotape of the first plane striking the first World Trade Center
tower (73%, Pezdek, 2003)
• A film showing the Estonia ferry sinking (55%, Granhag, Stromwall & Billings,
2003)
• CCTV footage of the explosion at the Sari nightclub in Bali (36%,
Wilson & French, 2006)
• Assassinations of Dutch politicians (66%, Smeets, Telgen, Ost et al., 2009)
• False Canadian news stories (Porter, Taylor & ten Brinke, 2008).
• CCTV footage of explosion of No. 30 bus in Tavistock square 7/7
(39%, Ost et al., 2008)
• Assassination of Swedish prime minister, Anna Lindh (64%, Sjoden,
Granhag, Ost & Roos af Hjelmsäter, 2010).
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False childhood memories
• Becoming lost in a shopping mall
(Loftus & Pickrell, 1995; Pezdek, Finger & Hodge, 1997)
• Spilling a punch bowl over the bride at a wedding
(Hyman, Husband & Billings, 1995)
• Being attacked by an animal
(Porter, Yuille & Lehman, 1999)
• Being hospitalised overnight with an ear infection
(Ost, Foster, Costall & Bull, 2005)
• Shaking hands with Bugs Bunny at Disneyland
(Braun, Ellis & Loftus, 2002)
• Taking a ride in a hot air balloon
(Wade et al., 2002)
• Putting slime in your teacher’s desk
(Lindsay et al., 2004)
• Becoming ill after eating hard boiled eggs
(Bernstein et al., 2005)
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False memories of sexual assault?
• Abduction by space aliens (Clancy, 2005)
• Satanic ritual abuse (Bottoms & Davis, 1997; LaFontaine, 1998)
• Retractors (Ost et al., 2001)
• Hypnotically-induced past lives (Meyersberg et al., 2009)
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Memory recovery techniques
• A whole variety of inappropriate techniques
were sometimes used in therapy to ‘assist’
people recall events from their childhood.
• Unfortunately, research shows that such
techniques (hypnosis, guided imagery, use of
photographs, age regression etc.) run serious
risks of creating false memories of events that
did not occur.
see Lynn, Krackow, Loftus, Locke & Lilienfeld (2015)
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6. Conclusion: Is memory for
traumatic events “special”?
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Conclusion
• Most of the effects of trauma on memory can be
explained in terms of ‘normal’ cognitive
psychological processes.
• Nothing inherently ‘special’ about memory for
trauma – it appears to be governed by the same
processes that apply to memory for non-traumatic
events.
• Although, of course, people may find it difficult to
disclose, or talk about memory for traumatic events.
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Conclusion
• One key goal for psychological science is how to
increase the likelihood that people who have
experienced traumatic events will disclose them
without increasing the likelihood that they will
generate memory errors (or false memories) in doing
so.
• Lorraine Hope will talk to you about some new
developments in this area in her presentation.
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Further reading
Brainerd, C, J. & Reyna, V. F. (2005). The science of false
memory. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
Lilienfeld, S. O., Lynn, S. J., & Lohr, J. M. (2015). Science
and pseudoscience in clinical psychology. New York:
Guilford Press (Chapters 5 & 8).
McNally, R. J. (2003). Remembering trauma. Harvard,
MA: Harvard University Press.
© Copyright 2014 iIIRG
www.iiirg.org
www.iiirg.org
© Copyright 2014 iIIRG