Elephant Illness

      The elephant discussed in this blog entry is mental health. A person may appear to be in good health but the physical dysfunctions that underlie the mentally afflicted may be at work.  If a mentally ill person is placed in the care of a therapist (friend or prayer partner) using memory based therapy  traumatic psuedomemories can be produced.  The inappropriate use of such therapy on someone in psychosis can lead to bizarre pseudomemories, false accusations, family estrangement, innocents being imprisoned and a myriad of other horrid personal outcomes.

How has our culture dealt with the mentally ill in the past?

      In the centuries prior to the 1800's all mental illness was seen as emerging from demons, witchery, evil spirits and other often supernatural sources.  Responses to mental illness included avoidance, isolation, restraints, imprisonment, torture, execution, burning at the stake or some combination of these actions.  All these horrid actions were meant to drive out the demons and evil thought to reside in the mentally afflicted person.   The transition away from these methods was slow partly due to the danger such people posed to those around them.  To protect themselves family members "disowned" the mentally ill person and claimed supernatural causes for the bizarre behavior, uncontrolled rage and/or horrid delusions .  The idea that mental illness was innate and caused by some spiritual deficiency still haunts us today. 

      In the 1800's psychoanalytical treatments arose that sought to assign causes for the emergence of mental illness.  Errors and wrongdoings while "training up a child in the way he/she should go" appeared to be a reasonable way to explain the mentally ill.  The assignment of natural causes for mental illness was in part related to the western culture's embrace of science.  Parental approaches, unhealthy relationships with parents, personal trauma and life conditions were seen as incubators of "mental illness" rather than supernatural spells or possession.   So for a century therapy was the dominant treatment for those who could afford it.   Increasingly options to calm and sedate the anxious, paranoid or manic patients came to include a variety of medications so that the ill person could be then be psychoanalyzed into health.  Eventually some psychiatrists came to recognize that medication was the primary and most reliable way to manage the symptoms of mental illness. The debilitating and often harsh side effects were worth the improvement in both emotional and mental functioning.  Doubts about psychoanalysis began to emerge as drugs alone appeared to help stem the symptoms and the counseling seemed haphazard in results and sporadic to the improvement which appeared dramatically when medication was provided in the right dosage.  Many psychiatrists noticed that mental illness popped up even among those who had healthy childhoods and new directions in research emerged during this fog of doubt starting in the 1950's.

      In the 1960's and 70's studies of twins separated at birth through adoption revealed that the emergence of mental illness occurred at the same rate for those twins raised together or separately in different families with different resources and experiences.  If mental illness  emerged at the same rate for both twins even though they were in different families then family dynamics could be ruled out as a factor in mental illness altogether.  This was a stunning finding.  The long held assumptions for over a century that parental approaches, personal trauma or life conditions alone created mental illness was debunked by these landmark "twin studies".  Additional research repeatedly revealed that the family conditions and personal life experiences alone did not always explain the emergence of mental illness.  

Institutionalized Autistic Children in 1982

     We can look at the most documented examples of the mistaken psychoanalytically based assumptions.   The traditional psychiatric view at one time held that "frigid mothers" caused Autism in a child.  This persistent view was researched thoroughly and repeatedly found to have data that was inconclusive.  The assumption was that mothers who failed to show affection created  the condition called "Autism" as the affection of parents was a "primary need".  Mothers were often shamed by therapists, isolated by society and divorced by fathers who felt betrayed.  In the end the cause of Autism is now accepted to be related to physiological factors that emerge prior to birth.  The degree of affectionate behavior of mothers is now known to have nothing to do with the emergence of Autism.  None-the-less families were utterly destroyed by the false assumptions over the last century and the resulting family breakup often meant institutional care for those suffering from this malady. This caused even greater harm for these ill children.  The sad thing is that intact families have now been found to be an important factor to helping the mentally ill reach fullest potential.  Unfortunately false assumptions of psychoanalytical therapists often  caused family breakups and helpless children to be institutionalized and often restrained as late as 1982 (in the picture below).

    Schizophrenia was thought to be the outcome of over involved parents or resulting from traumatic family experiences.   The high suggestibility of these mentally infirmed meant that "recovered memory therapist" could unintentionally "create memories" of events that never actually happened.  This was especially so among those mentally ill and vulnerable to emotionally charged suggestions that was made implicitly or overtly.  The outcome was often parents accused of horrific abuse that never happened, often the father could be jailed, employed parents were terminated from jobs, the family unit was isolated from the community as well as becoming estranged from the extended family.  In the 1980's studies finally confirmed that those suffering from schizophrenia did not have "over involved parents" or "childhood trauma" any more frequently than normal offspring.  Even when there was verified physical or emotional trauma in children many of the children went on to live productive lives at the same rate as those who did not have such verified events.   In 1999 the last such psychoanalytical assumption was found false when large scale study revealed that those with schizophrenia recovered more quickly without relapse if they were at home with involved parents.   This came as the final stake in the heart of psychoanalysis which had long held an errant view of how to treat schizophrenia.  Hospitalization away from from the family "causing trauma" was thought to be productive and helpful.  The data proved that involved parents made all outcomes better.   

       Additional physiological explanations emerged when studies of imprisoned violent offenders.   The study revealed that when trace metal imbalances in the blood were corrected reduced repeat offenses of violence to one fourth the levels of those untreated.   The results were stunning.  Such studies inferred biological reasons were at least a part of the cause for criminal behavior.   The researched links between mental illness and childhood challenges existed but even those from middle class homes with metal imbalances showed increased likelihood for violent behavior.  Increasingly, by the 1990's, the biological foundations began to be seen as a larger than expected contributor to pathological behavior.

     The examples and stories go on and on. The mistaken notion that mental illness always has a root in abusive treatment has been a destructive and harmful notion for over a century. In fact our society may have done better when we attributed these mental illnesses to the devil and curses! In that way at least the "innocent family members" were not victimized socially, economically or criminally.

How does modern psychiatry view mental illness?

      In 1985 a book titled "The Broken Brain: The Biological Revolution in Psychiatry"  Dr. Nancy C Andreasen MD, PhD proposed with detailed evidence the now widely accepted view among psychiatrists that biological processes explains the presence of mental illness.   Dr. Andreasen was chair of the Psychiatric Department at the University of Iowa, did extensive research on mental health using brain scans,  had written psychiatric textbooks and popular texts on mental health and received numerous awards over decades for her service.  In 2000 Dr Andreasen received a presidential award for science..  Her nomination stated:

          "Long before it was broadly acknowledged, Nancy Andreasen 
         understood that mental illnesses are biologically-based brain 
        disorders,  Her groundbreaking research on schizophrenia 
         has inspired hope for improved treatment and recovery..."

     Doctors, current in the research, now know of a variety of physical and biological dysfunctions that create psychosis with its high suggestibility state, paranoia, vulnerability to delusions and even bizarre hallucinations.  Physical causes and biological mechanisms leading to mental illness  now include metal toxicity,  food allergies, undermethylation, over methylation and personal metabolic tendencies that inappropriately eject needed nutrients as waste products when under stress.  Recreational drugs, medication, sleep deprivation and even excessive water intake can are now also known to create psychosis that result in similar forms of mental illness.

     A well known Psychiatrist, Dr. Abram Hoffer, was claiming adamantly as early as 1953 that a biological basis was at the root of mental illness. He was, in that regard, decades ahead of his peers who still saw psychoanalysis as the route to mental health.   He wrote a number of books on the treatment of those with mental illness and shared his insights regarding how to help the patient emerge from the illness in a book titled "The Orthomolecular Treatment of Schizophrenia" and on page 40 of that text he states:      

          "...I find it very helpful to have the family in my office 
         during the interview, with the patient's permission. A 
         lot of time is saved in gathering the information 
         needed to make the diagnosis.  It also helps when the 
         family hears the discussion and knows what the 
         treatment will be.  Although most psychiatrists no 
         longer blame the family for the illness of a relative,
         it can still occur.  It is important to remove any guilt 
        the family may have derived from previous outmoded, 
         harmful explanations."

Dr. Hoffer recognized, in the quote above that therapists with good intentions could implement errant treatments, using memory based therapies.  This harmful technique could be compounded if a mentally ill person in a highly suggestible state and vulnerable to delusions formed horrid pseudomemories of events that never actually happened.  Dr. Hoffer was aware that successful treatment of those suffering from mental illness often relied on families and family members.  The delusional patient treated with memory based therapy could accuse family members of horrid crimes, of being space aliens or of being part of an some effort by a government agency to control them.  The result of such delusions was often alienation from the very people that could best help the mentally ill person most.  Familial estrangement is one of the signs of mental illness.

Why does mental illness persist in spite of our wealth and knowledge?
        In 2019 experts in Memory wrote in alarm in the Journal of Psychological Science about the growth of false accusations and the influence of therapy using methods know to create false accusations. The article specifically addresses the hand in hand relationship between mental illness (psychopathology) and false memories:
        There is good evidence that certain forms of psychopathology 
         (e.g., schizophrenia) go hand in hand with a tendency to accept and give in
         to external pressure (Peters, Moritz, Tekin, Jelicic, & Merckelbach, 2012).  
         More importantly, existing work also indicates that psychopathology 
         (i.e., depression, PTSD) is linked to an enhanced propensity to produce
         spontaneous false memories. 

The connections between mental illness and false memories is only now being documented repeatedly in the research literature.  These false memories may be at the root of the many false accusations of physical abuse, sexual abuse and incest among other emotionally revolting crimes.

       In our culture mental illness is commonly associated with an inborn character flaw, a flawed spiritual formation or the outcome of some shameful trauma. None of these assumptions explain the presence of mental illness and those wrong assumptions work to suppress the needed discussion.   In our culture the family is often totally  unaware of the biological causes of mental illness because of the silence imposed by shame.  In fact a dysfunctional metabolism ignites mental illness that results in despondency, rage, paranoia, bizarre delusions and horrid hallucinations mistaken for reality.  Our city streets are full of such people today.  The mistaken notions about mental illness feed the ignorance, suppress discussion and prevent the proper care of the mentally ill person.  One would expect that the family would be aware of their common physiology but this is often not so. The shame and the silence it nurtures prevents learning about the true cause.  In fact a family may seek to distance themselves from the mentally ill family member.  Nothing could be worse as delusions are strengthened, rage and despondency rewarded and many of the ill live in a hopeless squalor.

    A just and compassionate response would be to support the family unit in the caring for the ill person. Part of the issue today is that the family is seen by many as the problem that causes or ferments the illness.  Actually the family, as Dr. Hoffer realized, has a huge impact in the successful outcomes (much better than institutionalization).  I hope, one day, that the data and research become better known.  Our entire society would be better off by encouraging recovery from mental illness rather than perpetuating the illness with lack of treatment and isolation from family.

Did you read to the end?  Thank You for your interest! The points that I make are based on research studies I have reviewed, on the books I have read on this topic and the personal experience our family has had in seeing a family member recover from mental illness.  

Books that I have reviewed on this topic may be of interest to anyone who read this far:

Hoffer, A, Orthomolecular Treatment for Schizophrenia (1999)

https://pursuitofhealthhappyliberty.blogspot.com/2019/04/review-orthomolecular-treatment-for.html

Walsh, W. Nutrient Power (2014)

https://pursuitofhealthhappyliberty.blogspot.com/2019/03/review-nutrient-power.html

Other references useful in formulating the summary a mental health treatment depicted above include:

Larson W. {2004). Science in Ancient' World Encyclopedia ABC-CLIO: Santa Barbara. CA: 29 30. 

Debus AG. (1970). Johann Hoachim Bechcr. In: GiIlispie CC. ed. Dictionary of Scientific Biography. I. Charles Scribners Sons: New York.

Conant J B, cxl, (1950). The Overthrow of the Phlogiston Theory: Revolution 1775—1789. I Harvard University Press: Carnbridge. MA; 14. 

Winkler KR ed. John Locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding I Hacket Publishing Company: Indianapolis, IN: 33-36.

Aristotle (350 BC). On the Soul (de anima).  Aristotle Vol. 8 (1936). Hect. WS, trans. Loeb Classical Library. William Heinemann: London; 1-203. 

Freud .S. (1940). An outline of psycho-analysis (the standard edition). In: Strachey J, ed. Complete Psychological Works Works of Sigmund Freud. W W Norton: New York. 

Adler A. : In: Ansbacher, HL and Ansbacher RR, eds. The Individual Psychology of Alfred Adler.  Harper Torchbooks: New York.

 Kendlcr KS. (1983).  Overview: a current perspective on twin studies of schizophrenia. Am J Psychiatry 14: 1413-1425. 

Bertelscn A, Harvald B, Hauge M. (1977) A Danish twin study of manic-depressive disorders. 130:330-351. 

Wender PH. Kccy SS. Rosenthal D, Schulsinger F. Ortmann J. Lundc l. (1986) Psychiatric disorders in the biological and adoptive families of adopted individuals with affective disorders..  Arch Gen Psychiatry. 43: 923-928

Snyder SH. (1986). Drugs and the Brain. Scientific American Books/ WH Freeman: New York

Purves D. Augustine GJ Fitzpatrick D. et al. (2004). Neuroscience. 4th ed. Sinauer Associates, Inc.: Sunderland, MA.

Restak RM (1984). The Brain. Bantam books: New York.

Nancy C Andreason, M.D., Ph.D., The Broken Brain, The Biological Revolution in Psychiatry (1985) Perennial Library, Harper & Row Publishers, New york

https://pursuitofhealthhappyliberty.blogspot.com/2019/07/the-broken-brain-biological-revolution.html

Black, D, Andreasen, N, Introductory Textbook of Psychiatry (2011) American Psychiatric Publishing, Inc., London England

Edelman, E, Natural Healing for Schizophrenia (2001)  Borage Books, Eugene Oregon

MENTAL ILLNESS AND FALSE ACCUSATIONS
HARMFUL PRAYER MINISTRIES
PERSONAL STORIES OF "MEMORY HEALING"
STORIES OF MEMORY BASED THERAPY 
 BOOKS ON MEMORY BASED THERAPIES

LEGAL CASES AND PRECEDENTS

VIDEOS ON MEMORY BASED THERAPIES

EXPERT LECTURES ON HARMFUL THERAPIES

MEMORY BASED THERAPIES NEWS

CLINICAL EXPERIENCES AND MEMORY THERAPY

EXPERTS COMMENT ON MEMORY THERAPY

OUR DAUGHTER BEFORE TREATMENT 

OUR TRAGEDY

====================================

Trauma and Profit

       Experts in psychology, psychiatry, legal and journalistic professions have

carefully researched memory based therapies and found them to create memories unsupported by the evidence.   Accusers often retract stories after the social circles that encouraged and supported the false memories dissipate.  In the early 2000's the courts realized that memory based therapies were creating a glut of wrongful convictions.  Legal reversals and settlements in favor of the falsely accused mounted.  Therapies based on eliciting tales of past horrid events subsided though are still used by the uninformed or ill informed.  In 2008 Dr. McHugh, a former Chair of Psychiatry at John Hopkins, predicted that a new wave of false diagnosis and therapies using the idea of "traumatization" and "victimhood" would emerge. Ten years later his dire predictions have been realized. History will repeat itself as innocent victims will be stripped of livelihoods, extorted for payouts and wrongly imprisoned based on events that never happened called pseudomemories.

Why Use Tragedy Producing Therapy?
        The Canadian Journal of Psychiatry published an article by numerous reputable psychiatrist in the US, Canada and England.   The article detailed how therapists surveyed in the United States and Canada hold incorrect views about memory and are as a result using dated therapies approaches that induce harmful outcomes.  A naive public, therapists and a highly influential but misguided entertainment media unknowingly perpetuate memory myths and the resulting damaging therapy.  Observation confirms that profit props up harmful memory based therapy and propagates poor outcomes.  How is this so?  
       Memory based therapies often use suggestion with vulnerable (often mentally ill)  clients. Thus this therapy does in fact generate memories of events that never happened.  There are numerous benefits to such pseudomemories for therapists.  Civil actions enrich the accuser for generating the false accusations.  The therapist now gets a richer serving a client able to afford more therapy. The therapist helps the client "dig up memories" of events that never happened.  The resulting emotional tumult extends the treatment and increases the total income for the therapist.   The profit motive props up those who practice what expert therapists know is  fraudulent mental health treatment.
        The client may have a variety of personal motives for the false memories that are written about and documented.   If the claims of abuse are "credible" and the presentation is convincing then there civil lawsuits that can win the client hundreds of thousands of dollars.  False memories implanted in children gain advantage in custody cases.  There is also the use of "victimhood" to garner sympathy and access to monetary assistance not otherwise available. You-Tube channels revealing "trauma" and websites seeking monetary support.  The client can directly profit monetarily by recounting false memories in a convincing fashion.   Sympathetic viewers moved emotionally by what seems to be sincere tales of horror unknowingly support the fraud.
         Lawyers on all sides experience additional opportunities for income.  Child custody disputes are common and lucrative.  Civil actions based on "repressed memories" from 10-70 years old can be the source of huge amounts of cash in civil settlements.  Institutions and wealthy families wanting to keep such talk suppressed fear such accusations and remain secluded.  Those falsely accused face the possibility of decades behind bars for false accusations so the stakes are high.   Lawyers on both sides of the contentious emotional controversies generated by poor therapies have clients willing to give up all assets to defend themselves.  The result is litigation that generates lucrative financial rewards all the lawyers involved.
        Expert witnesses that include forensic psychologists and medical doctors trained in "abuse" have a chance for bonus paydays.  It seems ludicrous but experts in trauma will use "poor memory" to substantiate the validity of claims.  The less accurate the details then the more traumatic the event.  A major defense of the accused historically is to cite the inconsistencies of recollections but with the new unproven science the inconsistent and inaccurate memory is now seen as proving the accuser correct.  Experts can then be called in to substantiate that "inconsistent and unreliable memory" validates the memory of trauma.  The innocent and accused then have little to no rational defense for an accuser believed because the story is errant and changing.  The innocent but falsely accused facing such "experts" must then hire "experts" who can help maintain that the accusations are based on truly errant memory.  More experts to sort out if the testimonies are reliable or relevant.  The high stakes and heightened emotions contribute to the increased income for experts who can bolster the accusers claims.
      "Child advocates" who work for institutions can justify a fully paid position that can protect the institution  with "safe policies" and determine when "accusations are credible" .  There are no policies that will ever stop false memories and the resulting false accusations but it does not matter.   This is a full time position.  The more accusations that require official action then the greater the impact and importance of the "child advocate".    So the advocate is enhanced by claiming as many false suspicions and false accusations as "credible" whether possible, impossible, true or not.  A lack of physical evidence assists in justifying a full-time staff person who benefits financially and professionally from more accusations whether true or false .
       "Child Protection Services" professionals experience growth and advancement when the load of cases they elect to take on increases.  Confirmation bias is known to be rampant as everyone in the system realizes they are needed more than ever if they confirm another accusation by every person with "memories" of  abuse. Child protection services have been known to be  directly corrupted by the money and as well as increasing departmental budgets and personal advancement in order to "protect innocent children".  Who would be against that?
      Detectives act quickly to become heroes and advance careers.  The greater the number of cases they present with convincing testimony the greater the need of their department.  The department is then given more resources and personnel to help more of those who "remember abuse".
      Prosecutors can benefit professionally in a number of ways.  Prosecutors know that highly emotional child abuse cases, even if the victim is an adult claiming to be a child,  quickly garner the sympathy of juries.  The convictions often need no expensive physical analysis of evidence (because they have none)  and are both cheap and fast.  This helps the "conviction rate" and shows the competence of the prosecutor as they are able to put more people in prison.  Their next reelection in assured with higher rates of cheaply obtained convictions and more declared criminals in jail (based on false memories).  Personal financial security, increased resources and professional resume building are the result of successful prosecution rates when emotionally charged cases needing little or no physical evidence are so easily and quickly convicted.
     "You Tube Counseling" sites have attractive, personable, vibrant emotive presentations describing repressed memories, trauma and dissociation with the associated ads, booklets and accounts available for subscription with special information.  They avoid the hundreds and hundreds of replicated studies debunking the errant memory myths but they will accept your views, clicks and money with bizarre tales of abuse that never happened. 
      Political influence can use traumatic false memories of abuse to destroy a candidate for any position.  Supreme court nominees can suddenly face scrutiny and false suspicions and hordes of angry partisans if someone can step up and generate an "memory" from 20, 30, 40 or 50 years ago.  Details of the candidates life (often quite public) can allow for creation of moments and locations of possible contact.   Students can get even with teachers using traumatic memories and false accusations that depicts the teacher as a sexual predator .  Priests can find themselves disowned, with no legal representation and tossed to the side after decades of service to their church based on an accusation that is unsupported by evidence, bizarre but still deemed "credible".   Accusations are an easy way to dispense with a person who you do not like for professional, personal or political reasons.  In the case of "childhood trauma" with the evidence bar so low for "credible accusations" unsubstantiated accusations can be very useful. 
       The financial and political pay offs of a system that encourages and protects false accusations are quite significant for clients using false accusations and the professionals who represent those clients.

Are there any Helpful Therapies?
         There are helpful therapies and approaches to mental  health that have clear evidence based outcomes which verify improvements in patients.  These improvements in treatments have accelerated immensely since the ground breaking book called The Broken Brain by Nancy Andreason who is Psychiatrist with both a Medical Doctorate and a Ph.D.
       Dr. Andreason points out that most of the psychological struggles people have are related to physiological issues affecting the brain that are untreated.  Hallucinations, delusions, mania and despondency can all be created with a variety of physiological problems.  She goes much further.  Dr. Andreason thinks that all of the mental health and psychological issues can be treated with somatic techniques that include medications and focus on physiological health.  Incredible results occur when a competent psychiatrist helps a patient or client regain occupational functioning, emotional stability and healthy family relationships.
       Somatic treatment need not be limited to medication.   A new breed of  counselors are now "naturopaths" and medical doctors who understand the metabolic impacts of nutrients.  Nutrients can also help those with psychological or mental health issues.  Abram Hoffer was a psychiatrist, and Medical Doctor with a Ph.D. who wrote, researched and practiced using a combination of somatic treatments and therapy to help those who were struggling with mental illness and psychological challenges.   His work was groundbreaking and he frequently was thwarted in his attempts to change the focus of his profession from psychotropic medication alone to therapy involving medication, nutritional supplements (such as niacin) and forward looking cognitive based therapy.
       Cognitive based therapy is the only therapy associated with positive outcomes despite the person who is using it and is recommended by those who carefully track outcomes.  In this form of therapy the client is challenged to think in new ways about what afflicts them.  It encourages more productive strategies to solving personal problems and  by adapting new strategies for making sound decisions, setting realistic personal goals and focusing on the present and the immediate future.  Cognitive based therapy has no need for recalling, imagining or creating trauma in order to "free" the client. A therapist that uses this approach exclusively will lose patients frequently because the patients implement to strategies, their lives improve and the client no longer needs "therapy".  Cognitive therapy fosters client indepence without blaming and repeated recollections of trauma.  The result are clients that move on and spend less on the therapist. 

          Unfortunately there is not much profit in a cure" that works and incredible profit for those who generate emotionally charged pseudomemories.  Our system is designed to reward false allegations of trauma.  This bodes ill for the future of our society.

Author: Dr. Tim Burgess

MENTAL ILLNESS AND FALSE ACCUSATIONS
HARMFUL PRAYER MINISTRIES
PERSONAL STORIES OF "MEMORY HEALING"
NEWS ON MEMORY BASED THERAPY 
 BOOKS ON MEMORY BASED THERAPIES

LEGAL CASES AND PRECEDENTS

VIDEOS ON MEMORY BASED THERAPIES

EXPERT LECTURES ON HARMFUL THERAPIES

MEMORY BASED THERAPIES NEWS

CLINICAL EXPERIENCES AND MEMORY THERAPY

EXPERTS COMMENT ON MEMORY THERAPY

OUR DAUGHTER BEFORE TREATMENT 

A FAMILY TRAGEDY

====================================

Further Reading:

American Psychological Association. 2001. Understanding Child Sexual Abuse

Baker, Robert A. Hidden Memories: Voices and Visions From Within (Buffalo, N.Y. : Prometheus Books, 1992.).

Crews, Frederick. (1997). Memory Wars: Freud's Legacy in Dispute. New York Review of Books Reprint Edition.

Dawes,Robyn M. Everyday Irrationality : How Pseudo Scientists, Lunatics, and the Rest of Us Systematically Fail to Think Rationally (Westview Press, 2001).

Erwin, Edward. (1995). A Final Accounting: Philosophical and Empirical Issues in Freudian Psychology. MIT Press.

Gardner, Martin. (2006). "The Memory Wars."Skeptical Inquirer. Part 1 is in vol. 30 no. 1, parts 2 and 3 are in vol. 30 no. 2.

Goldstein. Eleanor C. (1992). Confabulations: Creating False Memories, Destroying Families. Sirs.

de Rivera, Joseph. "'Trauma searches' plant the seed of imagined misery," The Sacramento Bee, May 18, 1993.

Hallinan, Joseph T. "Money for repressed memories repressed," Sacramento Bee, Jan. 12, 1997, Forum.

Johnson, M.K. et al. "Source Monitoring,"Psychological Bulletin, 114, 3-28.

Johnston, Moira. Spectral Evidence: The Ramona Case: Incest, Memory, and Truth on Trial in Napa Valley (Westview Press, 1999).

Loftus, Elizabeth and Katherine Ketcham. The Myth of Repressed Memory (New York: St. Martin's, 1994).

Mullen Paul E. and Jillian Fleming. 1998. "Long-term Effects of Child Sexual Abuse"

Ofshe, Richard and Ethan Watters. Making Monsters: False Memories, Psychotherapy, and Sexual Hysteria (New York: Scribner's, 1994).

Pendergrast, Mark. Victims of Memory : Sex Abuse Accusations and Shattered Lives 2nd ed. (Upper Access Book Publishers, 1996).

Schacter, Daniel L., editor, Memory Distortion: How Minds, Brains, and Societies Reconstruct the Past(Harvard University Press, 1997).

Schacter, Daniel L. Searching for Memory - the brain, the mind, and the past (New York: Basic Books, 1996).

Singer, Margaret Thaler and Janja Lalich. Crazy Therapies (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, Inc., 1996). Review of "Crazy" Therapies

Tavris, Carol. "Hysteria and the incest-survivor machine," Sacramento Bee, Forum section, January 17, 1993.

Wakefield, Hollida and Ralph Underwager. Return of the Furies - An Investigation into Recovered Memory Therapy (Peru, Illinois: Open Court Publishing Co., 1994).

"Debunking Myths About Trauma and Memory," (2005). Richard J. McNally, Ph.D. Canadian Journal of Psychiatry, Vol 50, No 13, November.

My review of Crazy Therapies by Singer & Lalich

StopBadTherapy.com

Twelve Myths about False Memories

Mass Media Funk: Study shows the longer one is in RMT, the more disabled one becomes

Statements by Professional Organizations on recovered memory therapy

"Truth or invention: exploring the repressed memory syndrome" excerpt from The Myth of Repressed Memory by ElizabethLoftus and Katherine Ketcham

"Remembering Dangerously" by Elizabeth Loftus

False Memory Syndrome Foundation WWW Page

Recovered Memories or Modern Witch Hunt? by Douglas E. Hill

Recovered Memory Therapy and False Memory Syndrome by John Hochman, M.D.

"First of All, Do No Harm" A Recovered Memory Therapist Recants An Interview With Robin Newsome By Mark Pendergrast

Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance: repressed memory therapy page

"Recovered Memories of Abuse: Assessment, Therapy, Forensics," By Kenneth S. Pope, Ph.D., ABPP and Laura S. Brown, Ph.D., ABPP

"Recovered Memories of Sexual Abuse: Scientific Research & Scholarly Resources" By Jim Hopper, Ph.D.

Lisa Nasseff claims therapist Mark Schwartz brainwashed her A woman is suing a St. Louis therapist, claiming he hypnotized her into falsely believing she had been a part of a satanic cult, had multiple personalities, and had taken part in satanic rituals.

Back to Salem: Paul Shanley and the Return of "Recovered Memory" by Alexander Cockburn

Exonerating the Friedmans by Chris Mooney

Experts Comment on Repressed Memories

       Recognized experts in psychology, psychiatry, legal and journalistic professions have carefully examined the "memory recovery techniques" and the idea of "repressed memories" since the 1990's.  Below are a few of the comments by the most widely recognized experts (each expert is credited with over 100 peer reviewed publications).  Legal experts in criminal law (US Federal courts) and civil lawyer (who also has a doctorate in psychology) are also quoted.

       Professional trauma memory researchers Steven Jay Lynne, PhD, James Evans, MS, Jean-Roch Laurence, PhD and Scott O Lilienfeld, PhD (from different reputable accredited Universities) performed a survey of practitioners and the general public about trauma and memory.  They jointly wrote a summary of three decades of research on memory and trauma and showed in the results of the survey that the practitioners and the general public were largely ignorant of what the science says about memory recovery (Can J Psychiatry. 2015 Dec; 60(12): 541–547).  The authors conclude that:
     "Beliefs can create reality. To the extent that laypeople—many of whom obtain psychotherapy—and mental health professionals hold outdated and poorly supported beliefs regarding the nature of human memory, mental health consumers and their loved ones will inevitably be exposed to psychological risk. In particular, many false beliefs about memory may contribute to the use of suggestive interventions geared to the recovery of repressed memories. These techniques include repeated prompting of memories, guided imagery, and hypnosis and hypnotic and nonhypnotic age regression". 

       Dr. James McGaugh from the University of California, Irvine. His expertise in the area of memory was once profiled on CBS’ 60 Minutes program. Dr. McGaugh said in a 2010 book:
     “I do not believe there’s such a thing as repressed memory. I haven’t seen a single instance in which a memory was completely repressed and popped up again." In a conversation he was quoted as saying “I go on science, not fads. And there’s absolutely no proof that it can happen. Zero. None. Niente. Nada. All my research says that strong emotional experiences leave emotionally strong memories. Being sexually molested would certainly qualify.”

       Dr. Richard J. McNally is a Professor and Director of Clinical Training in the Department of Psychology at Harvard University (world’s leading expert with OVER 250 peer reviewed publications on memory and trauma to his credit). In a 2005 letter to the California Supreme Court, Dr. McNally asserted:
     “The notion that traumatic events can be repressed and later recovered is the most pernicious bit of folklore ever to infect psychology and psychiatry. It has provided the theoretical basis for ‘recovered memory therapy’ — the worst catastrophe to befall the mental health field since the lobotomy era.
     Victim advocates will often vehemently complain to writers and editors of media where the truth about repressed memories is depicted. These attackers will falsely claim that there is a legitimate other side to this issue. There isn't. The public should be very aware of this. ”

       Dr. Grant Devilly, from the Psychological Health research unit at Griffith University (an expert in trauma and memory) says (in 2005) that: 
      "Memories of terrifying experiences work in the opposite manner of repressed memory theory. People rather wish they could forget their traumatic experiences. It’s the opposite. They wish they couldn’t think about it.”

       Dr. Elizabeth Loftus (University of California Irvine) has done many hundreds of peer reviewed psychological studies over the last three decades. Some of her are considered "landmark cases" in the field of memory because they are cited so often. She is a highly sought after expert witness and author of numerous books and articles which have been cited by courts at the highest state and national levels. She has won numerous awards for her courage and integrity. Dr. Loftus has personally witnessed innocent people, often with no previous record of any type, suddenly face accusations of heinous crimes decades earlier with no physical evidence and then sued, legally harassed and sometimes imprisoned. She shares insights based on her knowledge and experience:
     "...when I first started my trial work (as an expert in memory) I thought that there might be something to this idea of "repressed memories" and it seemed reasonable to assume that people could suppress some horrid memory that later might be recalled in detail.  I am now convinced that repressed memory is a myth many believe in despite the overwhelming evidence that repressed memories are false memories." (1998)
     "...In real life, as well as in experiments, people can come to believe things that never really happened." (2001)
     "...Just because someone thinks they remember something in detail, with confidence and with emotion, does not mean that it actually happened, False memories have these characteristics too." (2003)
     "...You can’t be raped for 10 years and not remember it. Yet, according to the repression aficionados, anything's possible." (2005)

       Dr. Chris R. Brewin in the New Oxford Textbook of Psychiatry. Edited, Oxford University Press, (2000), Pages 771-774 is recognized as an authority on repressed memories and recovered memory therapy states:
     "Proponents of 'recovered memory therapy' are now almost impossible to find within the ranks of leading psychiatrists and psychologists...Second, good practice now requires both the therapist and the client to adopt a critical attitude towards any apparent memory that is recovered after a period of amnesia, whether or not this is within a therapeutic context, and not to assume that it necessarily corresponds to a true event."

       Sydney Brandon, M.D. (Psychiatrist and researcher) in the peer reviewed British Journal of Psychiatry (April 1998, p. 302) writes:
     "Despite widespread....popular belief that memories can be 'blocked out' by the mind, no empirical evidence exists to support either repression or dissociation."

       Dr. Richard Ofshe, a social psychologist at the University of California, Berkeley who has extensively researched and written numerous books, articles and peer reviewed studies on the subject of "repressed memory" stated in 1997:
     "Recovered memory therapy will come to be recognized as the quackery of the 20th century." 

       Dr. Daniel Schacter (Professor of Psychology at Harvard University) states (1996):
     "...the phenomenon of memory repression, and the process of therapy used in these cases to recover the memories, have not gained acceptance in the field of psychology, and are not scientifically reliable." 

The quotes above were gleaned from respected researchers who have done or been involved in thousands peer reviewed studies at accredited institutions.    What few proponents there are in the field of "dissociated amnesia" or "recovered memories" are typically those who (1) have no degree in psychology/psychiatry from accredited programs and (2) do not take part in publicized peer reviewed studies that allow for official review and feedback.  

In addition there are legal and professional investigators with insights and impact:

       A Ruling  by the 2nd Federal Circuit Court overturned all convictions and ordered a review of all plea bargains that in any way use "repressed memories" as evidence (Friedmand 2010.)  That ruling was allowed to stand by the United States Supreme Court. In that ruling the justices stated
       "...Popular memory recovery procedures included hypnosis [including entranced states, blackouts and flashbacks], age regression, dream interpretation, guided abuse-related imagery, use of photographs to trigger memories, journaling, and interpretation of symptoms as implicit memories. These procedures and others commonly employed have great potential to induce false memories. Hypnosis, for example, has been shown to produce bizarre and impossible memories, including memories of ritualistic satanic abuse, memories from early infancy, memories from past lives, and memories from the future. The prevailing view is that the vast majority of traumatic memories that are recovered through the use of suggestive recovery procedures are false....."

       Dr. Barden has a doctorate in psychology and is also a lawyer with numerous large judgments against institutions that once used "repressed memories" to treat patients. Dr. Barden (1999) states:
     "Reform efforts have intensified...as thousands of U.S. families were destroyed by increasingly bizarre psychotherapies. The most damaging of these quack treatments involved the controversial and unscientific notion of "repressed memories" of childhood abuse. Using well known methods of brainwashing and coercion, irresponsible and often disturbed therapists convinced thousands of vulnerable patients that they had been horribly abused as children."

       Alan Gold, president of the Criminal Lawyers Association in Canada says
     "Repressed memories (recovered memories) are joining electroshock, lobotomies and other psychiatric malpractice in the historical dustbin." 

       Respected researcher and journalist Rebecca Meiser, states:
     "...memories, by nature, are fluid and malleable, easily influenced by suggestion. People told they were abused eventually believe that they were, regardless of fact. The mind creates a visual picture of the abusive act. And if a person is surrounded by others who encourage her to draw out these pictures and details, this new memory can become even more vivid than an actual remembrance. To complicate things further, the brain starts creating emotional responses to these memories, which seem to validate the claims even more."

             Dr. Harrison Pope has conducted research in a wide range of areas in psychiatry and has authored more than 300 peer-reviewed papers. Dr. Pope is also a well-recognized clinician with decades of experience in treating patients with psychiatric disorders, including patients with severe mood disorders and psychotic disorders.
     "A 'Repressed memory' is not an instance where an abused individual minimizes the awful harm being done by not confronting the perpetrator. This is an example of the typical actual abuse that is often revealed later. That abuse is, sadly, REMEMBERED all along. It was never "repressed."

Dr. Pope writes:

In Freud's theory of "repression" the mind automatically banishes traumatic events from memory to prevent overwhelming anxiety. Freud further theorized that repressed memories cause "neurosis," which could be cured if the memories were made conscious. While all this is taught in introductory psychology courses and has been taken by novelists and screenwriters to be a truism, Freud's repression theory has never been verified by rigorous scientific proof. --John Hockmann

Repressed memory therapy (RMT) is a type of psychotherapy that assumes that problems such as bulimia, depression, sexual inhibition, insomnia, excessive anxiety, etc., are due to unconsciously repressed memories of childhood sexual abuse. RMT assumes that a healthy psychological state can be restored only by recovering and facing these repressed memories of sexual abuse.

Any amount of sexual abuse of children is intolerable. Let me remind the reader that this article is about a particular type of therapy, not an article about sexual abuse. There are many people who suffer physical and psychological damage as a result of having been abused and many of these have been helped by good therapists. As Esther Giller notes: "More disturbance is associated with more severe abuse" and some research indicates that "at least 40% of all psychiatric inpatients have histories of sexual abuse in childhood" (Giller n.d.). Nevertheless, there is little scientific evidence supporting the notion that childhood sexual abuse almost always causes psychological problems in adults:

Research shows that about 1/3 of sexually abused children have no symptoms and a large proportion that do become symptomatic are able to recover. Fewer than 1/5 of adults who were abused in childhood show serious psychological disturbance. (Giller n.d.; Mullen and Fleming 1998; see also the American Psychological Association's Understanding Child Sexual Abuse.)

There is also little scientific evidence supporting the notions that memories of childhood sexual abuse are unconsciously repressed or that recovering repressed memories of abuse leads to significant improvement in one's psychological health and stability.

The Royal College of Psychiatrists in Britain has officially banned its members from using therapies designed to recover repressed memories of childhood abuse. The British Psychological Society, on the other hand, does not ban its members from such therapy, but in a 1995 report urged them to "avoid drawing premature conclusions about memories recovered during therapy." The report noted that a patient's recovered memory may be metaphorical or emanate from dreams or fantasies. The report also denied that there is any evidence suggesting that therapists are widely creating false memories of abuse in their patients, a charge levied by members of the False Memory Syndrome Foundation.

In the U.S.A., The American Psychological Association's Working Group on the Investigation of Memories of Childhood Abuse issued its final report in 1998. The report notes that recovered memory, if it exists, is rare.  It also states that 
       "there is a consensus among memory researchers and clinicians that most people who were sexually abused as children remember all or part of what happened to them although they may not fully understand or disclose it....At this point," according to the APA, "it is impossible, without other corroborative evidence, to distinguish a true memory from a false one." 
       Thus, says the APA report, a "competent psychotherapist is likely to acknowledge that current knowledge does not allow the definite conclusion that a memory is real or false without other corroborating evidence."


The Recovered Memory Therapy (RMT) "checklist"

Many of the more prominent RMT advocates use a checklist approach to diagnose repressed memories of childhood sexual abuse as the cause of a patient's problems, despite the fact that "there is no single set of symptoms which automatically indicates that a person was a victim of childhood abuse" (APA report). Works on child abuse promoting such a notion have been very popular among therapists and talk show hosts featuring Ellen Bass, Laura Davis (The Courage to Heal), Wendy Maltz, Beverly Holman, Beverly Engel, Mary Jane Williams and E. Sue Blume. Through communal reinforcement many empirically unsupported notions, including the claim that about half of all women have been sexually abused, get treated as facts by many people.  

       Dr. Carol Tavris writes 
     "In what can only be called an incestuous arrangement, the authors of these books all rely on one another's work as supporting evidence for their own; they all endorse and recommend one another's books to their readers. If one of them comes up with a concocted statistic--such as "more than half of all women are survivors of childhood sexual trauma"--the numbers are traded like baseball cards, reprinted in every book and eventually enshrined as fact. Thus the cycle of misinformation, faulty statistics and invalidated assertions maintains itself."

One significant difference between this group of experts and, say, a group of physicists is that the child abuse experts have achieved their status as authorities not by scientific training but by either (a) experience [they were victims of child abuse or they treat victims of child abuse in their capacity as social workers], or (b) they wrote a book on child abuse. The child abuse experts aren't trained in scientific research, which, notes Tavris, "is not a comment on their ability to write or to do therapy, but which does seem to be one reason for their scientific illiteracy."

Here are a few of the unproved, unscientifically researched notions that are being bandied about by these child abuse experts: (1) If you doubt that you were abused as a child or think that it might be your imagination, this is a sign of "post-incest syndrome" [Blume]. (2) If you can't remember any specific instances of being abused, but still have a feeling that something abusive happened to you, "it probably did" [Bass and Davis]. (3) When a person can't remember his or her childhood or has very fuzzy memories "incest must always be considered a possibility" [Maltz and Holman]. (4) "If you have any suspicion at all, if you have any memory, no matter how vague, it probably really happened. It is far more likely that you are blocking the memories, denying it happened" [Engel].

As a point of reference, the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics reports that a survey done of female state prison inmates in 1996-97 found that some 36 percent said they had been sexually or physically abused at age 17 or younger. The terms 'sexual abuse' and 'physical abuse' were not clearly defined; however, one-third reported they had been raped before incarceration. By comparison, 16 studies of child abuse in the general population found that from 12 percent to 17 percent reported they had been "abused" as children.

[Dr. Pope concludes]
       "Furthermore, people who have experienced traumatic events usually do not forget them.* Severely traumatic experiences are typically forgotten only if (a) the person is rendered unconscious at the time of the trauma; (b) the person is brain damaged before or by the trauma; or (c) the person is too young to make the necessary neural connections needed for long-term memory. Memories are not stored in some mysterious dark cellar, but in a complex network of neural connections involving several parts of the brain. Memories are lost because neural connections are lost, not because some homunculus stores them in the basement of the mind and lets them haunt the people upstairs in the room where clear consciousness dwells."

memory and repression?

Before discussing the methods and techniques of RMT, it should be noted that very few recovered memories of childhood sexual abuse first occur spontaneously. When they do, they are usually more likely to be corroborated by evidence than those evoked in RMT therapy.  In fact, in some cases corroborative evidence serves as the retrieval cue for the repressed memory.  RMT, however, seems to be able to produce recovered memories of sexual abuse in most of its clients.  To those practicing RMT, this is proof of its power and effectiveness.  To skeptical critics this is warning sign: the memories are confabulations suggested by prodding, suggestive therapy.

Daniel Schacter notes that the scientific evidence for repression is weak. Even weaker is the evidence that specific disorders are caused by repression. He notes the case of a rape victim who could not remember the rape, which took place on a brick pathway. The words 'brick' and 'path' kept popping into her mind, but she did not connect them to the rape. And she became very upset when taken back to the scene of the rape, though she didn't remember what had happened there (Schacter 1996, 232). One could posit that the victim really does have a full-fledged memory of the rape, but she has repressed it. Hypnosis could help bring forth this repressed memory. However, hypnosis or other methods starting with this assumption are risky as well as unfounded. The concept of implicit memory, i.e., memory without awareness, which is due to the fact that some neural connections have been made during a trauma, but not enough for a full-fledged recollection, could explain this rape victim's incomplete memory without assuming that she was recording memories while she was unconscious. The concept of implicit memory explains everything that is known about memory without making assumptions about what is not known.

Furthermore, even if traumatic memories are repressed sometimes, they are probably done so consciously and deliberately. Many of us choose not to dwell on unpleasant experiences and make a determined effort to wipe them from our memories as far as possible. We hardly desire some hypnotist or therapist to dredge up memories of experiences we've chosen to forget. In short, limited amnesia is best explained neurologically, not metaphysically. We forget things either because we never encoded them strongly enough in the first place or because neural connections have been destroyed or because we choose to forget them.


Recovered Memory Therapy (RMT) techniques

RMT uses a variety of methods--including hypnosis, visualization, group therapy, and trance writing--to assist the patient in 'remembering' the traumatic event. Hypnosis is risky because it is easy to lead and encourage the patient by suggestive or leading questions. Trance writing has never been proven to have any therapeutic value (Schacter 1996, 271). Group therapy, on the other hand, can become communal reinforcement of delusions, if the therapist is not careful. People in the group can encourage others to share bizarre tales without fear of ridicule. The group might not originate the repressed memory, but they might facilitate the birth and nourish the growth of horrendous fantasies.

Using guided imagery or visualization in therapy can also be dangerous. Sherri Hines describes how her therapist used this method to help her retrieve a memory of being abused by her father:

My father would give me a bath and he used to draw on the mirror, draw on the steam, and he would draw cartoon characters. And that was the seed for a memory; we would start with that.

And [my therapist] would tell me, 'You're in the bathtub. Your dad is there. He's drawing in the mirror. What is he drawing?' Then he'd say, 'OK, now your father's coming over toward you in the bathtub. He's reaching out to touch you. Where is he touching you?' And that's how the memories were created (Hallinan 1997).

Hines came to believe she was molested by her father and became so depressed she attempted suicide. She is now out of therapy and believes the memories were false and created in therapy.

The case of Diana Halbrook also brings into question the reliability of RMT methods.  In a trance writing session, Halbrook had written that her father had molested her.  This was shocking news to her! She went into group therapy and heard bizarre tales of satanic ritual sacrifices. Soon the same kinds of bizarre events appeared in her trance writings, including the recovered memory that she'd killed a baby.

Because Diana Halbrook's ritual abuse memories seems so outlandish, her doubts about the reality of these and her other recovered recollections continued to grow. But these doubts met resistance from the people in her support group and her therapist. "I continually questioned the memories, doubted them, but when I questioned the therapist, he would yell at me, tell me I wasn't giving my 'little girl within' the benefit of the doubt. Tell me that I was in denial. I didn't know what to believe. But I trusted him" (Schacter 1996, 269).

Halbrook got out of the therapy, characterized by Daniel Schacter as "toxic," and no longer believes the outlandish memories. Schacter comments that "the most reasonable interpretation is that the events [recovered in therapy] do not have any basis in reality."


Each of the various methods described above has been very successful in getting patients to "remember" many things of which they were unaware before therapy. The "memories" include not just memories of being sexually abused as children, but of some very bizarre things, such as being abducted by aliens for sexual experimentation or breeding, being forced to participate in satanic rituals, or being traumatized in a past life.

Psychologist Joseph de Rivera claims that in RMT "rather than help the patient separate truth from fantasy, the therapist encourages the patient to 'remember' more about the alleged trauma. And when the patient has an image--a dream or a feeling that something may have happened--the therapist is encouraged, praises the patient's efforts and assures him or her that it really did happen." This kind of therapy, he says, "confuses the differences between real and fantasized abuse and encourages destruction of families" (de Rivera 1993).

The False Memory Syndrome Foundation claims to have hundreds of such cases on file. Several cases have gone to court and therapists have been found liable for the harm caused by planting false memories. Despite the claims of hundreds of successful expeditions to recover lost memories by RMT therapists, some judges will not accept memories recovered in therapy as evidence. Judge William J. Groff of New Jersey wrote in case he heard in 1995 that

...the phenomenon of memory repression, and the process of therapy used in these cases to recover the memories, have not gained acceptance in the field of psychology, and are not scientifically reliable (quoted in Schacter 1996, 267).

It is true that another New Jersey judge, Linda Dalianas, did allow such testimony in a later case but she also stated that

...[t]he Court will not allow expert evidence regarding either the process or the plausibility of 'recovering' an allegedly repressed memory, because the experts have not offered any data either supporting or refuting any theory of how or whether a 'lost' memory might be recovered (Schacter 1996, 267).

In California, where a recovered memory not only was allowed but served as the basis for a murder conviction, the case was eventually overturned because of failure to reveal to the jury that the source of nearly every detail remembered about the murder could have been readily accessible newspaper accounts. It was also revealed that the person who claimed she had had a spontaneous flashback of the crime lied about that, as well as about whether she had recovered her memories of the crime during hypnotherapy.


Are RMT therapists creating false memories of abuse?

"The Memory Wars" is the apt title of Daniel Schacter's chapter on repressed memory in his 1996 book Searching for Memory. To enter the controversy over repressed memory and the psychotherapies used to "recover" memories of childhood sexual abuse is to enter a war zone.  On the one side--The Recovered Memory side--are those who maintain that patients with certain kinds of physical and mental disorders have repressed memories of childhood sexual abuse which must be recovered during therapy.  The other side--The False Memory side--maintain that the memories recovered in therapy are not recollections of actual childhood sexual abuse but are constructed memories built out of materials suggested to the patient or implanted by the therapist during therapy.

On the recovered memory side are Lenore Terr, Laura Brown, Kenneth Pope, Laura Davis, and Ellen Bass among others.   On the False Memory side are Elizabeth Loftus, Carol Tavris, Richard Ofshe and the False Memory Syndrome Foundation, among others.  Opponents in this war are not seen as colleagues in quest of the same truth, but as demons, villains or frauds.  Schacter seems to tiptoe on glass as he presents what is known, not known, guessed at, etc., in this area.  His conclusions seem pretty weak, if not contradictory, given the evidence he presents (272).

First, there is no conclusive scientific evidence from controlled research that false memories of sexual abuse can be created--nor will such evidence ever exist, because of ethical considerations. Second, there is likewise no definitive scientific evidence showing that therapy per se or specific suggestive techniques are alone responsible for the creation of inaccurate memories. Third, several separate strands, when considered together, support the conclusion that some therapists have helped to create illusory recollections of sexual abuse....

On the other hand, Schacter presents strong evidence from controlled research that memories can be created, and he makes a strong argument that repression, the conceptual basis for RMT, has little scientific support.  This concept has widespread acceptance in the psychological and psychiatric communities--as does the related theory of dissociation--but scientific studies demonstrating such mechanisms are lacking.  Those in the RMT movement begin with the assumption that the demonstration of any of a number of symptoms is evidence of childhood sexual abuse. Many of the symptoms would not necessarily indicate any deep psychological problems, much less a traumatic source.  Many could be symptomatic of a number of disorders having no basis in sexual trauma.  Therapists who assume their patients have been sexually molested, and assume that any memories they have, no matter how fantastic or delusional, are either accurate memories of abuse or symbolic of abuse, do not need to plant memories in their patients to find that they've been abused.  The therapists have determined a priori that whatever mental artifacts they uncover will lead the way to childhood sexual abuse as the cause of their patient's problems.

Studies by Marcia Johnson et al. have shown that the ability to distinguish memory from imagination depends on the recall of source information (Schacter 1996, 116). Thus recovered memories of abuse might be very vivid and accurate in many details, but incorrect about the source of the memory.  For example, in the case of Diana Halbrook it is very probable that the source of her satanic ritual memories is to be found in her group therapy.

memories of abuse as symbolic

One thing the RMT group has accomplished in these Memory Wars is to divert attention from the questionable mechanism of repression and their predetermined, unscientific methods of interpreting symbolic meanings of recollections, to the issue of whether the RMT therapists are planting memories in their patients. This was not intentional, but the result of a number of lawsuits against RMT therapists by former patients, all of whom recanted the memories of childhood abuse uncovered in therapy and blamed their therapists for ruining their lives by planting false memories of abuse in their minds. But the issue over whether a particular memory has been planted by a particular therapist is mainly of importance because the alleged memories are of horrible things and they are very disruptive and destructive of peoples' lives. If therapists were planting all kinds of good memories in patients' minds, helping them enjoy more satisfying lives and relationships, it is doubtful that there would be such an uproar.

Some of the memories recovered in RMT are extraordinarily bizarre, so bizarre that one would think that a reasonable person could hardly take them at face value. But RMT therapists are not put off by bizarre "recollections." They either take them at face value (as John Mack did of his alien abduction patients and others do when interrogating children). Or they take them as "artifacts" of the mind, which therapists must analyze as if they were archaeologists who must infer the real truth from the artifacts. Or they take fantastic memories as symbolic of real experiences.

Laura Brown, for example, a Seattle psychologist in the forefront of RMT says that fantastic memories are "perhaps coded or symbolic versions of what really happened." What really happened, she's sure, was sexual abuse in childhood. "Who knows what pedophiles have done that gets reported out later as satanic rituals and cannibalistic orgies?" asks Dr. Brown (Hallinan 1997).

In the past, Brown has criticized the False Memory Syndrome Foundation for being unscientific, but her emphasis on the symbolic nature of fantastic memories has little scientific credibility itself. Where is the scientific evidence that a fantastic memory can be distinguished from a delusion? How do we distinguish memories of real cannibalism from symbolic memories? We usually know what a crucifix or a swastika symbolizes, but what does eating an infant symbolize? Symbols might be ambiguous. How can we be sure that a memory is a symbol of child abuse and not of adult abuse by co-workers, or by other children who tormented the patient years ago, or by the therapist him- or herself? How can we be sure it is not a symbol of self-abuse? How can we be sure it is a symbol of any kind of abuse at all? What would distinguish a symbol of abuse from a symbol of fear of abuse? For that matter, what would distinguish a symbolic representation of fear of being abused from one representing fear of abusing someone else in the present, or a regret of having abused someone else in the past? The dangers and imminent probabilities of misinterpretation of symbolic memories should be obvious, especially when it is not always that clear that a memory really is a symbolic expression at all.

Are we to accept without question the notion that any memory, true or false, reflects some truth, objective or subjective, which only the trained therapist can determine? That seems to be the view of some RMT advocates. If so, we are being asked to accept mysticism instead of science. How could one possibly disprove the claim that a memory which is incredible on its face is a symbolic message? Can anyone imagine any empirical test for this notion? If the issue were simply whether a memory is accurate, there would be some hope of establishing in some cases that the probability is that the memory is true or that it is false. But if the issue is whether a memory has a meaning, that point will probably soon be granted, since we don't like to think of ourselves as doing anything without there being some reason for it.

How do we determine the real reason for a confabulation? Don't therapists and those of us who interpret memories or dreams become storytellers ourselves? As storytellers, isn't it reasonable to assume that our stories may not be literally true, but are symbolic and must be interpreted by another storyteller, ad infinitum? Perhaps "repression" is not to be taken literally, but symbolically. Perhaps each therapist must develop a subjective truth for concepts such as "repression" and "therapy." If this is so, then therapy is a dangerous weapon to be feared by everybody rather than a blessing to be sought by those with psychological problems. History is replete with examples of what happens when any group of authorities do not have to answer to empirical evidence but are free to define truth as they see fit. None of the examples has a happy ending. Why should it be otherwise with therapy? 

Original article found 4/10/2016 at:
http://skepdic.com/repress.html 

An Excellent Presentation on the Topic:

====================================

Further Reading:

American Psychological Association. 2001. Understanding Child Sexual Abuse

Baker, Robert A. Hidden Memories: Voices and Visions From Within (Buffalo, N.Y. : Prometheus Books, 1992.).

Crews, Frederick. (1997). Memory Wars: Freud's Legacy in Dispute. New York Review of Books Reprint Edition.

Dawes,Robyn M. Everyday Irrationality : How Pseudo Scientists, Lunatics, and the Rest of Us Systematically Fail to Think Rationally (Westview Press, 2001).

Erwin, Edward. (1995). A Final Accounting: Philosophical and Empirical Issues in Freudian Psychology. MIT Press.

Gardner, Martin. (2006). "The Memory Wars."Skeptical Inquirer. Part 1 is in vol. 30 no. 1, parts 2 and 3 are in vol. 30 no. 2.

Goldstein. Eleanor C. (1992). Confabulations: Creating False Memories, Destroying Families. Sirs.

de Rivera, Joseph. "'Trauma searches' plant the seed of imagined misery," The Sacramento Bee, May 18, 1993.

Hallinan, Joseph T. "Money for repressed memories repressed," Sacramento Bee, Jan. 12, 1997, Forum.

Johnson, M.K. et al. "Source Monitoring,"Psychological Bulletin, 114, 3-28.

Johnston, Moira. Spectral Evidence: The Ramona Case: Incest, Memory, and Truth on Trial in Napa Valley (Westview Press, 1999).

Loftus, Elizabeth and Katherine Ketcham. The Myth of Repressed Memory (New York: St. Martin's, 1994).

Mullen Paul E. and Jillian Fleming. 1998. "Long-term Effects of Child Sexual Abuse"

Ofshe, Richard and Ethan Watters. Making Monsters: False Memories, Psychotherapy, and Sexual Hysteria (New York: Scribner's, 1994).

Pendergrast, Mark. Victims of Memory : Sex Abuse Accusations and Shattered Lives 2nd ed. (Upper Access Book Publishers, 1996).

Schacter, Daniel L., editor, Memory Distortion: How Minds, Brains, and Societies Reconstruct the Past(Harvard University Press, 1997).

Schacter, Daniel L. Searching for Memory - the brain, the mind, and the past (New York: Basic Books, 1996).

Singer, Margaret Thaler and Janja Lalich. Crazy Therapies (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, Inc., 1996). Review of "Crazy" Therapies

Tavris, Carol. "Hysteria and the incest-survivor machine," Sacramento Bee, Forum section, January 17, 1993.

Wakefield, Hollida and Ralph Underwager. Return of the Furies - An Investigation into Recovered Memory Therapy (Peru, Illinois: Open Court Publishing Co., 1994).

"Debunking Myths About Trauma and Memory," (2005). Richard J. McNally, Ph.D. Canadian Journal of Psychiatry, Vol 50, No 13, November.

My review of Crazy Therapies by Singer & Lalich

StopBadTherapy.com

Twelve Myths about False Memories

Mass Media Funk: Study shows the longer one is in RMT, the more disabled one becomes

Statements by Professional Organizations on recovered memory therapy

"Truth or invention: exploring the repressed memory syndrome" excerpt from The Myth of Repressed Memory by ElizabethLoftus and Katherine Ketcham

"Remembering Dangerously" by Elizabeth Loftus

False Memory Syndrome Foundation WWW Page

Recovered Memories or Modern Witch Hunt? by Douglas E. Hill

Recovered Memory Therapy and False Memory Syndrome by John Hochman, M.D.

"First of All, Do No Harm" A Recovered Memory Therapist Recants An Interview With Robin Newsome By Mark Pendergrast

Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance: repressed memory therapy page

"Recovered Memories of Abuse: Assessment, Therapy, Forensics," By Kenneth S. Pope, Ph.D., ABPP and Laura S. Brown, Ph.D., ABPP

"Recovered Memories of Sexual Abuse: Scientific Research & Scholarly Resources" By Jim Hopper, Ph.D.

Lisa Nasseff claims therapist Mark Schwartz brainwashed her A woman is suing a St. Louis therapist, claiming he hypnotized her into falsely believing she had been a part of a satanic cult, had multiple personalities, and had taken part in satanic rituals.

Back to Salem: Paul Shanley and the Return of "Recovered Memory" by Alexander Cockburn

Exonerating the Friedmans by Chris Mooney

PERSONAL "MEMORY HEALING" STORIES 
MEMORY BASED THERAPY 
 BOOKS ON MEMORY BASED THERAPIES

LEGAL CASES AND PRECEDENTS

HARMFUL PRAYER MINISTRY

VIDEOS ON MEMORY BASED THERAPIES

EXPERT LECTURES ON HARMFUL THERAPIES

MEMORY BASED THERAPIES NEWS

CLINICAL EXPERIENCES AND MEMORY THERAPY

My daughter and I while visiting family in New England 

EXPERTS COMMENT ON MEMORY THERAPY

OUR DAUGHTER BEFORE TREATMENT 

A FAMILY TRAGEDY