Week 5

Question 1

Role of memories

Answer 1

Connect social relationships

-shared experiences

Connect with our own identities

• amnesia
• Alzheimer’s disease

Memories change our perception of who we are

Question 2

Questions to ask when we remember something…

Answer 2

Are we remembering the original event?

Are we remembering what we remembered the last time we tried to think of that event?

Is it because we’ve been told the story or seen a picture of the event?

Question 3

Motivated forgetting

Answer 3

The idea that we forget because we are motivated to forget, usually because a memory is unpleasant or distrubing

Two types: supression (conscious) and repression (unconscious)

Question 4

Two types of motivated forgetting

Answer 4

1. Supression
   
   1. Motivated forgetting that occurs consciously
2. Repression
   
   1. Motivated forgetting that occurs unconsciously (Freud)
      
      1. Makes all other defense mechanisms possible (Freud)

Question 5

Supression

Answer 5

Motivated forgetting that occurs consciously

Consciously avoid thinking about it, and attend to other things

Question 6

Repression

Answer 6

Motivated forgetting that occurs unconsciously (Freud)

Some memories are so horrible that our mind automatically pushes them into our unconscious

Makes all other defense mechanisms possible (Freud)

Question 7

Recovered memory and false memory

Answer 7

Recovered memory

• a repressed memory that has once again become consciously accessible

False memory (i.e., pseudomemory)

• a memory for an event that never occured

Question 8

Repression vs. Natural forgetting

Answer 8

NOT the same!

Natural forgetting

• tends to occr when people do not think about prior events
• little controversy

Question 9

Repressed memory debate

Answer 9

Clinicians side

• traumatic event
• memories can be repressed
• memories can be recovered accurately, years or event decades after an event occurs

Experimental psychologist side

• no traumatic event
• memory unavailable because it does not, and never has existed
• memory is falsely created (suggestion, leading questions, coercion)

Question 10

Statute of Limitations

Answer 10

The maximum amount of time after a crime that legal proceedings can be initiated

• Fraud, 3 years in Cali

Murder, NONE

Purpose:

To protect people against claims made after

• physical evidence has been lost
• witnesses become impossible or difficult to find
• memories for the event have faded

Child Sexual Abuse

Sex abuse alleged to have been committed when victim was under 18 years old

-> anytime prior to victim’s 28 birthday

Employmeny of minor to profeorm prohibited acts

-> 10 years after offense

Question 11

Ruth v. Dight, 1969

Answer 11

Ruth went to hospital for surgery by Dr. Dight

After, abdominal pain -> x-ray -> surgical instrument still inside

X-ray taken 22 years after surgery (long after statute of limitations expired)

–> Doctrine of delayed discovery

Question 12

Doctrine of Delayed Discovery

Answer 12

Statue of limitations commences when the plantiff knew, or should have known, that they were injured

• statute of limitations is tolled when the plantiff’s ignorance is “blameless”

Question 13

Statute of limitations and doctrine of delayed discovery require a blancing act between

Answer 13

Right of plaintiff to prosecute

Protection of respondent from stale claims

Question 14

Tyson v. Tyson

Answer 14

Nancy (daughter) in therapy

Recovered memories of father’s sexual abuse (father denied)

Nancy 26 when filed claims

• > father made motion for summary judgement (request for review of case to see if even worth trial)
  
  • > Wash State Supreme Court decided it wasn’t worth it
    - > psychoanalysis/therapy is for assistance, not about if recovered events are true

Lead to new legislation:

Wash state passed doctrine of delayed discovery to be applied to repressed memory cases

Question 15

People v. George Franklin

Answer 15

FIRST case to admit repressed memory as testimony

-> defendant’s daughter recovered memory after therapy (hypnosis) and cue

convicted 20 years after crime

Question 16

Washington v. Paul Ingram

Answer 16

Daughter accused father of abuse

Father underwent hypnosis, confessed to: rape, animal sacrifice, being leader of satanic cult that killed 25 babies

Richard Ofshe showed that father was highly suggestible

• asked father something that daughter never reported, father confessed to doing it

—> used as evidence for false confession

Conviction never overturned

Question 17

Ramona v. Isabella

Answer 17

Gary Ramona (father) accused by daughter to have abused her

Claim came after daughter attended therapy by Marche Isabella

—> “80% of all bulimics have been sexually abused”

Father lost wife, daughters, job

–> sued daughter’s therapist as third party

 - \> awarded damages
 - \> first time third party sued therapist and won

Question 18

For a theory based on repressed & recovered memories to be supported, what must be true?

Answer 18

1. Traumatic memories must be - at least sometimes - repressed
2. Repressed memories must be - at least sometimes - recovered accurately

Question 19

Issues with repressed memories

Answer 19

Memory of traumatic events

• assumption: traumatic memories are “different”
• > may depend on the question asked

Repression

->PTSD as counterargument because cannot get trauma out of mind

Dissociation

• split in consciousness; psychologically detach themselves from traumatic situation
• > in turn may affect normal cognitive functioning, including attention and memory processes
• evidence that we can process info below conscious awareness
  
  • > Madame D: told husband dead, no memory but bad feeling at door where she was told
  • > Claparede: anterograde amnesia, dr. shakes her hand with pin in it, next time she refuses to shake his hand stating “sometimes pins are hidden in people’s hands” (evidence that some memories form without conscious awareness)

Cue-dependent retrieval

• dichotic listening task (difference seen in implicit task, but not explicit)
  
  • > recognition task, poor
  • > spelling task, nearly twice as likely to spell less common homophome (evidence for unconscious processing)
• people may forget things not because it’s not in memory, but because we don’t have the right cues
• > along with event/memory, code context, which can be used as a cue
• People v. George Franklin
• > daughter remembered what father did by cue

Suggestiveness and social influence

• Goodman et al. (2003) 30% African Americans did not disclose as opposed to 15% overall

Question 20

Memory of traumatic events

Answer 20

• assumption: traumatic memories are “different”
• > may depend on the question asked

Question 21

Repression

Answer 21

->PTSD as counterargument because cannot get trauma out of mind

Question 22

Dissociation

Answer 22

• split in consciousness; psychologically detach themselves from traumatic situation
• > in turn may affect normal cognitive functioning, including attention and memory processes
• evidence that we can process info below conscious awareness
  
  • > Madame D: told husband dead, no memory but bad feeling at door where she was told
  • > Claparede: anterograde amnesia, dr. shakes her hand with pin in it, next time she refuses to shake his hand stating “sometimes pins are hidden in people’s hands” (evidence that some memories form without conscious awareness)

Question 23

Cue-dependent retrieval

Answer 23

• dichotic listening task (difference seen in implicit task, but not explicit)
  
  • > recognition task, poor
  • > spelling task, nearly twice as likely to spell less common homophome (evidence for unconscious processing)

People may forget things not because it’s not in memory, but because we don’t have the right cues

-> along with event/memory, code context, which can be used as a cue

People v. George Franklin

• daughter remembered what father did by cue

Question 24

Anderson & Green

Answer 24

Presented word-pairs to subjects

• think/ no think
  
  • > respond to words / supress words

Cued recall

-> supressed words were recalled less often

Question 25

Willians- Seminal study

Answer 25

Claimed to be evidence for repressed memories

• 38% did not report having been abused
• > some not old enought during event to remember (10 months old)
• > some may not have been ready to admit/ face abuse

Question 26

Goodman et al. (2003)

Answer 26

Increased likelyhood of disclosing

• older when abuse ended
• maternal support following disclosure of abuse
• more severe abuse

Ethnicitiy & dissociation

• 30% African Americans did not disclose as opposed to 15% overall

Does NOT support idea of special memory mechanisms

Question 27

Repressed memory studies

Answer 27

Loftus, Polonsky, & Fullilove (1993)

• 18% claimed forgot the abuse for a period of time and later regained the memory

Herman and Schatzow (1987)

• 28% reported severe memory deficits

Briere and Conte (1995)

• 59% reported that, at some point, they had not remembered the forced sexual experience

Question 28

Evidence that people can experience events for which they have no conscious memory

Answer 28

Madame D (told husband dead, no memory but fear at doorway where told)

Korsakoff’s patient (cannot store new memories, but won’t shake had because previos time had pin)

Eich, 1984 (word pair implicit task, spelled less common homophome)

Question 29

Evidence that people can supress memories for non-traumatic events

Answer 29

Anderson & Green, 2001

Presented word-pairs to subjects

• think/ no think
  
  • > respond to words / supress words

Cued recall

-> supressed words were recalled less often

Question 30

Evidence (perhaps) that people can repress memories for traumatic events

Answer 30

Williams, 1994

Claimed to be evidence for repressed memories

• 38% did not report having been abused
• > some not old enought during event to remember (10 months old)
• > some may not have been ready to admit/ face abuse