Research finds repressed memories don't exist

[roo_ster]

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/09/06/3003364.htm?section=world

"Yeah, that bit about where we traumatized and mind-raped your kids to the point that they testified to events that never occurred and you ended up in prison as a "child molester" for a decade & a half...never mind."

The melding of two pseudo-sciences...what could possibly go wrong?

[vaskidmark]

While I applaud efforts to assist

Soldiers returning from war zones, victims of violent crime and sexual abuse, can now be helped by cognitive behaviour therapy, where they learn to assign terrible memories to the past, instead of them crowding their present and future

I'm somewhat hesitant to believe, let alone trust any effort by a group that depends on the continuation of symptmology for it's paycheck to take up this effort on a wholesale basis.

Professor Devilly says the therapy is working.

"We're now getting, at the end of between 8 and 12 sessions, 90 to 92 per cent of people no longer meet the criteria for PTSD," he said.

   Is it just me, or is there an actual correlation between the number of sessions that the "average" MH health insurance policy will authorize and the number of sessions needed to achieve these results?

And is it just me, or is there some correlation between the discovery of a "cure" and the recent astronomical increase in the number of PTSD disability claims that DOD/VA/.gov is facing?

Now psychologists are working to fend off post traumatic stress in high-risk occupations, by teaching recruits to develop resilience.

  Uh huh.  The average recruit into the all-volunteer military has personality characteristics so strikingly different from the rest of their compatriots in the general population that this goal is, IMHO, bordering on bringing coal to Newcastle.

Finally, what implication(s) will this have on those who have already been diasgnosed with PTSD?  Will the Am. Psychiatric Assn. and its boards change their mind and declare that one may be released from a diagnosis at some time?  And will that decision be tied in any way to the possibility that disability compensation may be withdrawn based on this announcement that there is a "cure"?

As I have mentioned before, I carry a PTSD diagnosis.  Currently there is no way to get that wiped off my record -  no, not the VA record but the MH system's record.  Once diagnosed, always that diagnosis, just like the alcoholics.  I am not currently receiving, or seeking, disability compensation although there is a very good chance that under the current rules I could easily qualify.  It's not the intrusive thoughts so much that trouble me but the "coping skills" I developed to deal with them.  I figured out how to put the memories of the past in the passt, and keep them out of the present and the future.  It just happened that in order to be able to do that I adopted certain behaviors that others say are less than desirable.  Do I give up what works when all the other alternatives offered so far have not?  Or has the art of MH treatment figured out some brand new set of behaviors that nobody has ever contemplated before that might - or might not - work for me?  I'm just wondering why I have not heard of that new paradigm yet.

stay safe.

[taurusowner]

Modern psychology is one of the most unreliable "sciences" in existence.  The day we gave psychologists any weight in the courtroom, we made a mockery of evidentiary procedures.  The bottom line is: we really don't know jack #### about the human mind.  We drag self proclaimed "experts" in to dazzle jurists with pseudo-science words and technobable, and get convictions or acquittals based on essentially nothing.  It's basically a whole industry of lazy people who think they can "feel" their way to facts.

[TommyGunn]

 

Research finds repressed memories don't exist

 
I love "blanket statements" and such generalizations.
Maybe some "repressed memory" stuff is hokum.  OTOH I can understand how the mind of someone who's been traumatized could repress the memory of a very unpleasant situation. 
And, certainly the use of psychiatry in courtroom precedence has taken a turn for the worse as prior posters state.
But the real truth can be more complicated than this being just true or false.

[vaskidmark]

I'm wondering how many folks are aware of the difference(s) between "repressed memories" and memories that have been repressed?

The former emerged about 20 years ago, and grew into professional and legal popularity as a source of evidence of previous childhood sexual abuse/physical abuse and child/adult rape.  It became a contest between social workers (usually those associated with Child Protective Services agencies) and psychotherapists who were offering their services to the prosecutors to see who could pull up the most cases just before the statute of limitations expired.

The latter are best described as the recollection of events that someone should have and be able to bring to consciousness but, for whatever reason, is unable to recall.  At one time the phrase "traumatic amnesia" was used to describe the phenomenon.

The former have in many quarters been considered to be in the same realm as the "guided/assisted communications" that are delivered by special helpers of those with the physical inability to communicate.  (Not just not speak, but not able to communicate via any means - except through their special interpreters.)

stay safe.

[Hawkmoon]

In a briefing to the US Supreme Court, Professor Richard McNally from Harvard University described the theory of repressed memory as "the most pernicious bit of folklore ever to infect psychology and psychiatry".

He maintains false memories can easily be created by inept therapists.

Well, no [bleep], Sherlock.

I became certified as a clinical hypnotherapist about 25 years ago, and this was known and accepted back then. There was (and, I assume, still is) an entire sub-specialty called Forensic Hypnosis, which requires a diligent effort on the part of the hypnotist to scrupulously avoid phrasing questions to the subject in any way that could be leading, or imply what answer was wanted or expected. Over the years I have read numerous reports and studies that ALL pointed out how easy it is for an unscrupulous (or even a well-meaning but improperly trained) hypnotist to permanently contaminate a subject's memory banks.

[Antibubba]

That researcher has been trying to disprove repressed memories for years, so if he researched them and found out they DO exist, how do we know he isn't repressing his own research?

[Scout26]

My Phrenologist claims that Psychology and Psychiatry are simply modern day Astrology and Alchemy.






 

[taurusowner]

My Phrenologist claims that Psychology and Psychiatry are simply modern day Astrology and Alchemy.



 

No, that's forensic science, remember?   





 

[roo_ster]

No, that's forensic science, remember?   

Astrology grew into astronomy and alchemy into chemistry. 

There is hope contemporary forensic "science" will one day mature enough to sit at the "grown up" science table.  Same with psychology. 

[longeyes]

Astrology grew into astronomy and alchemy into chemistry.

More like saying dodos grew into eagles.

Alchemy, according to some, was never about material transformation but rather a metaphor for spiritual evolution.

[Tallpine]

I read all about this once and then completely forgot about it 

[roo_ster]

More like saying dodos grew into eagles.

Alchemy, according to some, was never about material transformation but rather a metaphor for spiritual evolution.

Well, alchemy had some respectability back in the day, considering some of the greatest minds in history had side pursuits in alchemy, Isaac Newton being only one.  Mathematics, Physics...Alchemy.

Most forensic science still hasn't even done its homework and some of what is currently crap science will be proved out and some will be proved crap.

[longeyes]

Yes, that's right, it did, but my point is what alchemy was really all about.  Newton wrote more about the occult than science.

[vaskidmark]

I read all about this once and then completely forgot about it 

Don't you mean you repressed your memory of it, until some jackwagon therapist came along and reawakened the sleeping pygmy?

stay safe.

[PTK]

CBT is, according to Andrew Samuels, a psychotherapist and professor at the University of Essex, "a coup, a power play by a community that has suddenly found itself on the brink of corralling an enormous amount of money. Science isn't the appropriate perspective from which to look at emotional difficulties. Everyone has been seduced by CBT's apparent cheapness."

For what it's worth, the casual use of CBT here in MT is to treat "bad behavior" such as drug abuse, depression, antisocial tendencies, etc. It's bunk.

I have no reason to believe that CBT is magically more useful in any other category, since the glut of data shows that it is mostly about the almighty dollar.

[Tallpine]

Don't you mean you repressed your memory of it, until some jackwagon therapist came along and reawakened the sleeping pygmy?

stay safe.

I'm not sure whether I read about it before and then forgot/repressed it, or whether I never read about it and this thread just caused me to think that I read about it before 

Either way, I think I'm going to need some serious liquid counseling     

[vaskidmark]

Either way, I think I'm going to need some serious liquid counseling     

At least you will stay young that way. 

stay safe.

[Hawkmoon]

CBT is, according to Andrew Samuels, a psychotherapist and professor at the University of Essex, "a coup, a power play by a community that has suddenly found itself on the brink of corralling an enormous amount of money. Science isn't the appropriate perspective from which to look at emotional difficulties. Everyone has been seduced by CBT's apparent cheapness."

For what it's worth, the casual use of CBT here in MT is to treat "bad behavior" such as drug abuse, depression, antisocial tendencies, etc. It's bunk.

I have no reason to believe that CBT is magically more useful in any other category, since the glut of data shows that it is mostly about the almighty dollar.

CBT

[vaskidmark]

CBT

C ognitive B ehavioral T herapy.

http://www.nacbt.org/whatiscbt.htm  or http://www.nami.org/Template.cfm?Section=About_Treatments_and_Supports&template=/ContentManagement/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=7952 

stay safe.

[MechAg94]

C ognitive B ehavioral T herapy.

http://www.nacbt.org/whatiscbt.htm  or http://www.nami.org/Template.cfm?Section=About_Treatments_and_Supports&template=/ContentManagement/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=7952 

stay safe.

Dude, you like can't introduce new acronyms without like letting us know.  That's just not right, man. 

[MechAg94]

Astrology grew into astronomy and alchemy into chemistry. 

There is hope contemporary forensic "science" will one day mature enough to sit at the "grown up" science table.  Same with psychology. 

I would say astronomy came first.  You can't really use the stars to predict anything without some background of study.  If you don't have the knowledge first, you might as well just be sun/moon worshipers or something. 

[vaskidmark]

Dude, you like can't introduce new acronyms without like letting us know.  That's just not right, man. 

Dude,

Talk to Hawkmoon who was asking PTK.

I just jumped in to edumacate the masses, man.

stay safe.

[Tallpine]

Dude, you like can't introduce new acronyms without like letting us know.  That's just not right, man. 

And you probably do not want to Google "CBT" 

[vaskidmark]

And you probably do not want to Google "CBT" 

Relax, Tallpine.  it does not start until page 2.

And when you get your mind out of the gutter, you might consider using some of this stuff.  http://www.chrisrawlinson.com/2010/01/axe-detailer-ball-washer/

stay safe.