Childhood Sexual Abuse: Article Analysis

Of the many problems faced by children and adolescents, few provoke such moral outrage as childhood sexual abuse. Many times, as on the television show “To Catch a Predator”, such abuse can be inflicted by strangers who may gradually become familiar with the child online. Sadly, however, often times the perpetrator of sexual abuse on children is someone much more familiar to the child- someone the child may even love.

The study of creation of false memories has been a topic of interest since the 1930s when Bartlett (1932) conducted the first experiment on the topic. Though the results of this experiment were never replicated, they contributed greatly to research by distinguishing between reproductive and reconstructive memory (Bartlett 1932 as cited in Roediger & McDermott, 1995). Reproductive memory refers to accurate production of material from memory and is assumed to be associated with remembering simplified materials (e.g., lists). Reconstructive memory emphasizes the active process of filling in missing elements while remembering and is associated with materials rich in meaning (e.g., stories).

The sudden recovery of repressed memories from a traumatic event such as childhood sexual abuse can be both validating and confusing for clients that are seeking help with various problems. These new memories might be able to help client identify the cause of their feelings and issues that are affecting their life. However for others it can be a very difficult time because of the conflicting emotions about the abuser. Worst of all when dealing with the recovery of repressed memories they may be all together false. The accuracy of recovered memories in regards to sexual abuse is low and can come with significant consequences. These false memories can be very harmful to the client as

The seriousness of this problem is exemplified in the cases of individuals creating false memories of sexual abuse as a result of therapy. These types of events caused vast amounts of research to be done on the topic. The Deese–Roediger–McDermott (DRM) paradigm has been one of the most popular in false memory research and it continues to be a topic of interest today. A search of “DRM” in all text and “False Memory” in subject terms, using PsycINFO, gave results of 560 peer-reviewed articles published in research journals within the last five years (2011-2016).

False memories have been studied science the early 1990’s because they have become controversial topic. In the beginning they was no thought that your memory would be unfaithful and that if you had a memory that you “recovered” it had to be true because your memory couldn’t fail you. Could it? Well one woman’s disbelief caused her, Susan Clancy, who was a Harvard University graduate student at the time decided that while everyone else was arguing over the accuracy of recovered memories, she would create a study on them (Grierson 1). Clancy first started out by interviewing her subjects that said to have recovered memories of abuse after they had gone through therapy. The stories were horrifying but she was brought up to believe that what they were telling her was true. But, soon after she found herself wondering if they had even really went through these events that they “recovered”. When she spoke out against the recovered memory patients saying that they couldn’t of forgotten such a traumatic memory and that they had created a false memory by going to the therapy the hate mail started coming in (Grierson 3). Throughout this time many other scientists started to do more and more research on false memories and most of the studies have concluded with the same information. “The false memory researchers point to other research showing that traumatic events are normally remembered all too well. They argue that

The authenticity of repressed memories has been the cause of much controversy in the psychology world. Some even refer to these controversies as the “memory wars”. One side supports the idea of repressed memories, saying that there are multiple reasons for memories to be forgotten and retrieved later. The latter disagrees with how legitimate repressed memories are, since there is no way to prove the honesty of the memories presented.

One research article focus to explain that adults survivors of childhood sexual abuse are continually recovering memories due to the idea of dissociate memories. Meaning that during their abuse, children may disconnect their attention during molestation, and the more it repeatedly happens, the stronger seems to be the dissociation. The

When a person has a fabricated or distorted recollection of an event, they are experiencing a false memory. A false memory is a mental experience that is mistaken for a veridical representation of an event from one’s personal past. (Kendra Cherry) There are two types of false memories: minor and major. A minor false memory can be some as simple as someone thinking they left their keys on the table, but actually left them in the bedroom. A major false memory could be someone believing they have been abducted from aliens. False memories occur frequently and can take control over someone’s life. Therapists have many approaches that they use to try and help one recollect their memory. While trying to help, they may actually worsen the problem. Research supports the salience of false recollections over accurate ones in people, potentially indicating that every person in a given society can fall victim to their effects. Revealing that this theory has more truth than many expect affecting many people within our societies.

Four hypotheses were given in this experiment. Results from each were consistent with its hypotheses. 1) The recovered memory group attained higher scores on the false recall and false recognition test than the control. These results are consistent with the only other experiment that measures memory distortion. This previous study dealt with memory distortion of victims of childhood sexual abuse (Clancy et al., 2000). People who are more prone to exhibit false recall and false recognition in the laboratory are more likely to do the same in real life. 2) Repressed memory and recovered memory participants exhibited more false recall and false recognition than the control group. 3) The recovered memory did score higher than any group in both false recall and false recognition.

Psychologists have diligently studied the human mind for many years and have yet to discover some of the ways that the brain performs simple and complex tasks. Since the knowledge that has been obtained concerning processes of the brain remains a mere fraction compared to what is unknown about cognitive functioning, individuals cannot fully grasp the reasoning behind why the brain performs some of the acts it does. Many people daydream, picture themselves recovering lost items in obscure places, or even create stories repeated so much that individuals begin to believe they may have happened; all three of these examples are forms of creating a false memory. Many psychologists have researched, evaluated, and experimented with false memory, which has lead to the discovery of False Memory Syndrome, a condition in which individuals contract false memories while almost always remaining oblivious to the act of creating a memory that is not factual or concrete (Berger 1). False memory syndrome develops as a result of many different internal and external forces such as mind manipulation in psychological malpractice, severe trauma to the brain in the first few years of life, a traumatic experience, or even by forcing one’s self into believing an entirely made-up thought; however, seemingly healthy individuals can contract the syndrome without the slightest idea it is present.

The first study had resulted in the opposite of what l would assume would only support the theory of false memories being instilled into subjects. In addition, I also noticed how the wording of certain questions, may have had an influence on whether or not subjects recalled events that never happened. It was only when participants were being told to recall certain events, rather than being asked, that they were allowed room to expand their imagination, thus going as far as to vividly describe an event that never occurred. The second study divided the theory of the fabrication of memories, and suggested that some people may be immune to believing false memories. What l found to be interesting about the second study, was that researchers divided their subjects into two groups, with one of their groups being individuals with a highly superior autobiographical memory - yet, investigators were still able to

The issue of 'false' vs. 'repressed' memories is of increasing relevance to counseling psychologists and indeed to any professional involved in therapy. The reputation of therapy is at stake, as clients begin to sue therapists for the implantation of false memories. In turn, it is essential that all clinicians conduct their therapy according to the latest guidelines of practice as to avoid suggestion and the possible implantation of false memories.

Many people who are victims or others in general that have taken part in a traumatizing event have stated that they cannot recall what they have experienced or what they have committed. This is what we call today as repressed memory. Repressed memory is caused by how an individual experiences a stressful or traumatizing event. It happens because the victim of repressed memory faces a certain event like the one stated above, which then leads into the event being blocked out unconsciously. (Loftus, 1993) If we were to take a look at an article that talks about how victims have experienced repressed memory we can see that repressed memory can actually resurface. Lisa Nosal talks about how victims of repressed memory show up into her office and start questioning her on why the memories are coming back after a couple of years. (Nosal, 2015). One of her patients has said that “I’ve been fine for years. Now I have nightmares every night and can barely function at work. What’s going on?” (Nosal, 2015) This shows that when repressed memory resurfaces and hits the victim back, it could actually result in a major negative effect on their daily life. It gives each victim of repressed memory a sense of despair. It gives them a sense of despair because throughout their life that memory has been gone and all the sudden it came back at them. This will make the victim feel as if he or she is never going to be able to let go of this trauma. This could have a major impact on their life in many ways. Lisa has an explanation for the reason why repressed memory resurfaces and also has a solution for how victims of it can recover from it. Her answer to why repressed memory resurfaces is that “in my experience as a therapist, what’s happening is that some deep, inner part of you finally feels safe and stable enough to address the leftover emotional fallout that’s been patiently waiting for years.” (Nosal, 2015) This shows that the reason why the memory gets repressed is because the human mind represses it to avoid pain. It gets repressed so that when the victim is finally ready, the mind will slowly bring back the memory so that whatever is leftover can be taken in by the person. Lisa talks about how an individual can deal with the

While these studies do not fully exemplify the harmful reality of false memories, they take a step towards understanding how these false memories might occur in real-world settings. As Loftus (1997) discusses, it is only natural to wonder whether or not this research is applicable to real-world situations such as being interrogated by law officers or in psychotherapy. What researchers have learned, and can apply to this practical problem is that there are social demands on individuals to remember and come up with detailed memories. Not only that, but memory construction through suggestion and imagining events has been shown to be explicitly encouraged when people are having trouble remembering events (Loftus, 1997).

The mode of implantation from the researchers included telling the participants multiple accurate childhood memories and would include one false memory (Loftus, 1997). The researchers validated the memories told to the participants by informing each participant that their parent(s) had been spoken to and those memories had been offered up (Loftus, 1997). Some of the false memories included being lost in a shopping mall when younger or spilling a drink onto the dress of a bride at a wedding (Loftus, 1997). 37% of those with the implanted memories found themselves able to recall the false memory provided in great detail and were often found to contain much emotion on the part of the participant (Loftus,