NCJ Number
223036
Journal
Journal of Child Sexual Abuse Volume: 17 Issue: 1 Dated: 2008 Pages: 20-37
Date Published
2008
Length
18 pages
Annotation
This study examined child sexual abuse memories.
Abstract
Findings suggest that traumatic amnesia develops when a pathological forgetting mechanism, dissociation, fragments the experiential and reflective selves; and remits when a special recall mechanism, dousing, supports their integration. This case describes bodily experiences that appeared to cue child sexual abuse memories during psychotherapy by a woman who was amnesic for her childhood and suffered from chronic dissociative states. The findings show that amnesia and recovering memories involve normal and abnormal memory mechanisms; that remembering during psychotherapy is complex; that psychotherapy need not be suggestive; inaccessible memories may act as constraints on suggestibility; and that narrative recall may depend on the connection of bodily experiences with self-reflection. Claims that psychotherapy implants false abuse memories assume that patients lack internal barriers to accepting suggestions that violate their history. The study case suggest that some child sexual abuse victims know when suggestions are false even if they cannot explain why; and some child sexual abuse victims can recover confident memories without being led. Therapists should be extremely cautious about encouraging patients to confront family or take legal action on the basis of returning memories without corroboration because their meaning may be ambiguous, may not be literal, and may change over time. Table, references