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Recovered memory techniques are bogus, report says
Copyright ) 1998 Nando.net
Copyright ) 1998 Scripps Howard
LONDON (January 13, 1998 01:31 a.m. EST http://www.nando.net) -- British
psychiatrists have waged a devastating attack on colleagues who use
bogus techniques to plant false memories of sexual abuse in patients,
according to an unpublished report which was delayed for more than a
year because therapists feared its criticisms.
A copy obtained by the Guardian shows that the inquiry commissioned by
the Royal College of Psychiatrists has concluded that any memory
recovered through hypnosis, dream interpretation or regression therapy
is almost certainly false.
It blames these "dangerous and powerful tools for persuasion" for
spawning hundreds of false accusations against parents, destroying
families and undermining the credibility of genuine abuse victims.
Mistaken diagnoses have made patients more likely to feel suicidal and
to engage in self-mutilation, the report says.
Dr. Sydney Brandon, chairman of the report's working party, said the
General Medical Council, the governing body for the British medical
profession, should respond to complaints from patients by striking off
psychiatrists who persist in using the techniques.
He urged colleagues to review their notes and if necessary contact
patients who believed their recovered memories.
The report's key finding is that people do not bury memories of abuse.
On the contrary, their problem is that they cannot forget.
"Despite widespread clinical and popular belief that memories can be
'blocked out' by the mind, no empirical evidence exists to support
either repression or dissociation.
"No evidence exists for the repression and recovery of verified,
severely traumatic events, and their role in symptom formation has yet
to be proved."
False memories tend to date the abuse from an earlier age than genuine
cases, often when the person was an infant.
"The very inability to recall abuse is taken as a sign that abuse has
occurred but is being 'denied' through the process of repression. The
therapist and patient embark together upon the process of recovering
hidden memories," the report says.
Therapists are also criticized for using all-embracing symptom
checklists -- such as headaches, celibacy, promiscuity and wearing baggy
clothes -- that exclude few people.
Entitled "Recovered Memories of Childhood Sexual Abuse: Implications for
Clinical Practice," the original report was submitted to the Royal
College of Psychiatrists in the summer of 1996.
Its findings appalled some members, who lobbied for it to be disowned. A
compromise was agreed whereby watered-down guidelines were issued last
October, but the report itself would no longer be published under the
imprimatur of the College.
Dr R.E. Kendall, the college president, confirmed that a revised version
will appear as an article in the British Journal of Psychiatry in April,
thus distancing the college from controversy.
The report's four authors damn "memory enhancement techniques,"
including:
-- Drug induced abreactions "produce material which is often a product
of fantasy."
-- Hypnosis "increases the confidence with which the memory is held
while reducing its reliability."
-- Age regression "accounts are at times so fantastic that they are
beyond belief and there is no evidence of (its) efficacy."
-- Dream interpretations "usually reflect the training and personal
convictions of the therapist".
By RORY CARROLL, The Guardian
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