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F M S F O U N D A T I O N N E W S L E T T E R (e-mail edition)
Spring 2007 Vol. 16 No. 2
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ISSN #1069-0484. Copyright (c) 2007 by the FMS Foundation
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The FMSF Newsletter is published 4 times a year by the False Memory
Syndrome Foundation and delivered electronically. It is also available
at on the FMSF website: www.FMSFonline.org. Those without access to
the Internet should contact the Foundation.
1955 Locust Street, Philadelphia, PA 19103-5766
Phone 215-940-1040, Fax 215-940-1042
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Dear Friends,
Good news and sad news fill this issue of the newsletter. Some sad
news is that Harold Lief, MD, a courageous founding member of the FMSF
Scientific and Professional Advisory Board, died in March. A very
active member of the board, his papers and talks had a powerful effect
on increasing awareness of the problems of memory recovery techniques.
Dr. Lief, who was always professional and especially courteous, became
the center of international attention in 1993 when radical "feminist"
hecklers prevented him from making an invited presentation about false
memories at McGill University. The irony of this event was that the
hecklers gave enormous positive publicity to the Foundation, in no
small part because of the contrast in Lief's attempt to engage in a
discussion and the hecklers' refusal. Dr. Lief will be greatly missed.
Some good news is that the California Supreme Court tossed out all but
one of the charges in the case against FMSF Scientific Advisor
Elizabeth Loftus, Ph.D., for the 2002 publication of the article, "Who
Abused Jane Doe? The Hazards of the Single Case History." Nicole Taus,
who identified herself as the "Jane Doe" of the article when she filed
a lawsuit against Loftus, the publisher of the article, and three
other people, is required to pay the expenses Elizabeth Loftus
incurred in defending herself against the discarded charges. The other
defendants and many of the initial charges had already been dismissed
by lower courts.
The seeds of this case were planted in 1997 when David Corwin and Erna
Olafson published an article about a person that Corwin had
interviewed and videotaped as a child and later as a young woman.
Corwin and Olafson claimed that they had documented evidence that
people could repress and later recover accurate memories of abuse.
Loftus and coauthor Melvin Guyer decided to investigate the case, but
they arrived at a very different conclusion. Before they could publish
their results, however, Nicole Taus filed an ethical complaint against
Loftus at the University of Washington in connection with the
research. Although Loftus was exonerated, her records were confiscated
for almost two years.
The Loftus case continues to be of great interest to newspapers,
writers, and others concerned with First Amendment rights of free
speech. After Taus filed the initial complaint, the defendants filed a
motion to have it dismissed, arguing that the lawsuit was a "Strategic
Lawsuit Against Public Participation" (SLAPP). SLAPP suits are
considered retaliatory lawsuits intended to silence, intimidate, or
punish those who have used public forums to speak, petition, or
otherwise move for government action on an issue of public interest.
With one exception, the California Supreme Court agreed that the suit
should have been dismissed, writing:
"[I]t is apparent when the determinations of the Court of Appeal and
this court are viewed as a whole that the overwhelming majority of
plaintiff's claims properly should have been struck in the trial court
under the anti-SLAPP statute. Under these circumstances, and
consistent with the fundamental purpose of the anti-SLAPP statute to
minimize the chilling of conduct undertaken in furtherance of the
constitutional right of free speech, we conclude that it is
appropriate to award defendants their costs on appeal."
Loftus has vigorously denied the remaining charge -- that she
improperly intruded into private matters by misrepresenting her
relationship to Corwin when she interviewed Taus's former foster
mother. Loftus's attorney has stated that he is confident that Loftus
will prevail. Loftus, in the meantime, has discussed her concern that
in this whole legal tangle, an important person has not been heard
from: the young mother who lost custody of her little six-year-old
daughter.[1] Loftus is sure that her research shows that the mother
was almost certainly wrongly accused. Indeed, the mother thanked
Loftus for her work and both Loftus and the mother hoped that there
might be some sort of reconciliation with the daughter. Loftus still
hopes that when the people who have encouraged Taus in her lawsuit
stop encouraging her, that a reconciliation might still be possible.
More good news is the decision of the Canadian Supreme Court that
memories enhanced by hypnosis are scientifically and legally
unreliable and should not be allowed in criminal trials. (See below)
In the United States, the decision about whether to allow such
testimony still varies by state.
There are more article reviews than usual in this issue because of the
continuing stream of excellent papers that push our understanding of
recovered memories forward. For example, would you believe that
someone might come to think that he or she had proposed marriage to a
Pepsi machine? On page 4, Seamon and colleagues report on an
experiment in which this very thing happened.
On page 8, Howe and colleagues analyze the research and conclude that
there is as yet no reason for the claim that "basic memory processes
or their development conform to a different set of rules for
maltreated children than other, non-maltreated children." This is an
important conclusion since some researchers have suggested that
children who dissociate should have poorer memories than children who
do not and that dissociation is a way that a child copes with a
traumatic experience.
In the recovered-memory literature it is generally assumed that trauma
causes people to dissociate. On page 10, Merckelbach and Muris turn
that notion on its head arguing that it is possible that dissociation
encourages self-reported traumatic experiences.
Kimberly Wade provides a extensive critique of a new article by Steven
Smith and David Gleaves who review recent literature on long-term
forgetting. See below. Wade points out that even though the article
appears to provide a fair review of the recovered memory literature,
it fails to include important criticisms of some of the research they
review and neglects entirely the extensive literature on false
memories. This article is especially helpful in understanding how
proponents and critics can come to different conclusions about what
the research says.
In a recent issue of Psychological Medicine, Harrison Pope and
colleagues published the results of their "Repressed Memory
Challenge." See below. The challenge was an offer of $1,000 to the
first person who could find an example in written works published
before 1800 of a description of a person who had a repressed memory
caused by a traumatic event. Since the publication of the article and
ensuing publicity, the authors awarded the $1,000. to someone who
found an example in a 1786 opera. [2] Pope has indicated that this
shows that the notion of repressed memories arose slightly earlier
than he had originally thought. He and his colleagues are now working
on another paper to explain more precisely how the concept of
repressed memories appears to have evolved in the mid-1780s.
Readers will be saddened with the news of the death of Ray Souza. FMSF
member Frank Kane wrote a moving tribute to Ray on below. Ray and
Shirley Souza epitomize the tragic situation of families caught up in
FMS hysteria in 1993. They were convicted and kept under house arrest
for 9 years for such bizarre claims as keeping their grandchildren in
a cage in the basement, a basement that investigators never looked at
or they would have seen that it had a huge picture window looking into
it. It seems unlikely that such a conviction could happen now. There
has been progress.
PAMELA
[1] Loftus, E. (2007, March 16). Personal communication.
[2] Pope, H. (2007, March 27). Personal communication.
______________________________SIDEBAR_______________________________
/ \
| "It has been argued in some quarters that an attack on RMT |
| [recovered memory therapy] is an attack on psychotherapy in |
| general. To the contrary, our hope is to support effective therapy |
| as strongly as we can. By demonstrating that RMT is a dangerous |
| form of treatment, adversely affecting the lives of the patients |
| subjected to these techniques, and having a catastrophic effect on |
| the family, we wish to enable professionals and their patients to |
| discriminate between 'good' and 'bad' psychotherapy. Any 'good' |
| psychotherapy has to help patients to understand and, if they |
| wish, change their irrational and maladaptive behavior patterns. |
| This can be done without recourse to pseudo-memories of trauma. |
| There is enough genuine trauma to go around." |
| Lief, HI & Fetkewicz, JM. (1999) |
| Casualties of recovered memory therapy: |
| The impact of false allegations of incest on accused fathers |
| In Review of Psychiatry, Vol. 18 |
| RC Friedman & JI Downey, Eds., 115-141 |
\____________________________________________________________________/
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In Memoriam:
HAROLD I. LIEF
FMSF Scientific Advisor
Harold I. Lief, M.D., a psychiatrist and emeritus professor at the
University of Pennsylvania died on March 15, 2007. Dr. Lief was was
one of the first physicians to advocate the teaching of human
sexuality in medical school. In the mid 60s only three medical schools
in the United States and Canada had such programs. By 1980, only three
did not. Starting in 1991, Dr. Lief was also known for his work in
cautioning people against non-critical acceptance of claims of abuse
based on repressed memories.
Born in Brooklyn, Dr. Lief received his bachelor's degree from the
University of Michigan in 1938 and medical degree from New York
University in 1942. He served in the Army Medical Corps during World
War II and was the first doctor to enter some of the concentration
camps at the end of the war. It was this experience, he said, that
prompted his interest in psychiatry. After the war, he did his
psychiatric residency at Long Island Medical Center and later attended
Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons for
psychoanalytic training.
Dr. Lief, a courageous founding member of the FMSF Scientific and
Professional Advisory Board, remained very active in the fight against
false accusations based on recovered memories. In this effort, he
helped many affected families, served as an expert in legal cases,
gave professional talks, and wrote professional papers. Indeed, Dr.
Lief was one of the first professionals to speak out on the topic and
in 1992 wrote:
"The horrors and consequences of legitimate sexual abuse should
never be minimized, but there is another side to this
situation-false allegations that destroy innocent families."
Dr. Lief became the center of international attention in 1993 when
radical "feminist" hecklers prevented him from making an invited
presentation about false memories at McGill University. With his
customary dignity, Dr. Lief "won the day" and provided enormous
publicity for the Foundation.
Harold Lief touched the lives of many in the FMSF -- families,
retractors and professionals. He will be deeply missed. If you would
like to share thoughts or anecdotes about your experiences with
Harold, please send them to the Foundation. They will appear in the
next newsletter.
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LOFTUS CASE:
COURT TOSSES ALL BUT ONE CLAIM
Taus v. Loftus, S133805. Cal Sup. Ct. Filed Feb. 26, 2007.
(Decision available at:
www.courtinfo.ca.gov/opinions/documents/S133805.PDF)
On February 26, 2007, the California Supreme Court ruled in the Taus
v. Loftus case that journalists and scholars can be held liable for
invasion of privacy if they misrepresent themselves in order to obtain
information. In a 5 to 2 decision written by Chief Justice George, the
court tossed out three of the four issues under examination. Justices
Moreno and Baxter dissented, arguing that all four items should have
been stricken. The court ordered that Taus pay the costs of the Loftus
appeal writing:
"[I]t is apparent when the determinations of the Court of Appeal and
this court are viewed as a whole that the overwhelming majority of
plaintiff's claims properly should have been struck in the trial
court under the anti-SLAPP statute. Under these circumstances, and
consistent with the fundamental purpose of the anti-SLAPP statute to
minimize the chilling of conduct undertaken in furtherance of the
constitutional right of free speech, we conclude that it is
appropriate to award defendants their costs on appeal." Majority
opinion, page 78.
Readers may recall that Elizabeth Loftus, a courageous founding member
of the Scientific and Professional Advisory board of the Foundation,
and Mel Guyer conducted an investigation into the 1997 "Jane Doe" case
study published by Corwin and Olafson [1] after widespread claims were
circulated that the study proved that people could repress and then
recover accurate memories of abuse. Loftus and Guyer arrived at a very
different conclusion, but before they could publish their results,
Nicole Taus and Lynn Crook filed ethical complaints against Loftus at
the University of Washington in connection with the research. Although
Loftus was exonerated, her records were confiscated for almost two
years. In 2002, Loftus and Guyer published "Who Abused Jane Doe? The
Hazards of the Single Case History."[2]
Soon after the publication of the article, Nicole Taus filed a
complaint [3] against Loftus and Guyer. The complaint also named Carol
Tavris, who had written about the Loftus/Guyer article, the Skeptical
Inquirer, that had published the article, the University of
Washington, and Shapiro Investigations, a firm that had helped Loftus
and Guyer in their investigation. The complaint had four causes of
action: negligent infliction of emotional distress, invasion of
privacy, fraud, and defamation.
Some of the defendants filed a motion to have the complaint
stricken. They argued that the Taus lawsuit was a "Strategic Lawsuit
Against Public Participation" (SLAPP). SLAPP suits are retaliatory
lawsuits intended to silence, intimidate, or punish those who have
used public forums to speak, petition, or otherwise move for
government action on an issue of public interest. The trial court
denied most of the actions to strike and the defendants appealed. The
Court of Appeal concluded that the majority of the Taus claims should
have been dismissed, but it held that the legal case could proceed on
four counts of action against Loftus. Loftus then appealed to the
California Supreme Court. The case received wide attention and the
Court received a number of amicus briefs, especially because of its
importance to First Amendment issues.
The California Supreme Court then reviewed whether the Court of Appeal
properly concluded that the following actions against Loftus should
remain. The four actions were: 1) Loftus defamed Taus in a talk at an
October 2002 FMSF seminar in Chicago; 2) Loftus disclosed private
facts about Taus in a deposition; 3) Loftus improperly intruded into
private matters by collecting information from court records; 4)
Loftus improperly intruded into private matters by misrepresenting her
relationship to Corwin. The Court dismissed the first three actions
and ordered that Taus must pay Loftus' legal expenses.
Loftus has vigorously denied the accusation of the remaining action
that she misrepresented her relationship with Corwin when she
interviewed Taus's former foster mother, Margie Cantrell. Ms. Cantrell
has declared that she was contacted by Loftus in 1997 and that Loftus
said that she was the supervisor of David Corwin. Cantrell provided
some details about Taus's life. In the majority decision, Chief
Justice Ronald M. George wrote that "personal information about a
person that happens to be known by the person's relatives or close
friends is not information that has entered the public domain." In
their dissent, Justices Carolos R. Moreno and Marvin R. Baxter wrote
that Nicole Taus had no reasonable expectation that her former foster
mother would not talk about her. "The majority's desire to protect
society from the kind of misrepresentations alleged in the present
case is understandable...will likely chill vigorous journalistic
investigation because of the inherently problematic nature of the
relationship between journalists and their news sources." The
California Supreme Court ordered that the claim be settled at the
trial level.
An attorney who represented the news media expressed concern that the
decision will cause problems for other journalists and investigators
who may interview third parties. [4] He said that that it was not
unusual for embarrassed news sources to later claim that they had been
misled.
Supporters of recovered memories have claimed victory in this case. In
a letter to the Los Angeles Times, Joyanna Silberg wrote that the
California Supreme Court upheld the viewpoint of the Leadership
Council, on human-subjects-research.[5] In its decision, however, the
California Supreme Court on page 32, footnote 11, expressly noted
that:
"[T]he Court of Appeal rejected plaintiff's claim that the first
amended complaint stated a cause of action based on defendants'
alleged breach of professional ethics, and plaintiff did not seek
review of that ruling. Accordingly, the human-subjects-research
issue raised by amicus curiae is not properly before us and will not
be addressed."
Loftus's attorney said that he was pleased that most of the lawsuit
was dismissed and that the Court decided that Taus must pay Loftus'
legal bills. Burke said that Loftus will be able to prove that she did
not misrepresent herself. "There was no trickery and no misrepres-
entation," he stated. "It was a four-hour interview and [the foster
mother] knew who she was speaking to."[6]
Elizabeth Loftus commented that she is gratified that the vast
majority of the claims were dismissed. She said that the one remaining
claim is completely untrue. She also noted that in all of this case
there is something missing: the voice of the falsely accused mother.
Thomas Burke of Davis Wright Tremaine in San Francisco represents
Elizabeth Loftus. Julian Hubbard of Hubbard & Ebert in Redwood City,
California represents Nicole Taus.
[1] Corwin, D.L. & Olafson, E. (1997). Videotaped discovery of a
reportedly unrecallable memory of child sexual abuse: Comparison
with a childhood interview videotaped 11 years before. Child
Maltreatment 2, 91-112.
[2] Loftus, E.F. & Guyer, M.J.(2002, May/June, July/August). Who
abused Jane Doe? The hazards of the single case history. Skeptical
Inquirer, Part 1, 24-32. Part 2, 37-40. Article available at:
faculty.washington.edu/eloftus/Articles/Jane Doe.htm.
[3] Taus v. Loftus. No FCS 021557, Sup. Ct. of Cal., Solano
County. See FMSF Newsletter 12(3).
[4] Dolan, M. (2007, February 27). Ruling may constrain researchers.
Los Angeles Times. Retrieved on February 27, 2007 from
www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-speech27feb27,1,4612801.story.
[5] Silberg, J. (2007, March 5). Ethical guides are already in place.
Los Angeles Times.
www.latimes.com/news/printedition/opinion/la-le-monday5.7
mar05,1,7876122.story?coll=la-news-comment
[6] Ward, S.F. (2007, March ). Interview methods face trial.
ABAJournal.com. Retrieved from www.abanet/journal/redesign/
m5reserch.html on March 14, 2007.
+--------------------------------------------------------------------+
| CORRECTION: FAMILY HISTORIES |
| In the last issue we incorrectly named the organization with which |
| Laura Pasley is working. Following is the corrected version. |
| |
| Laura Pasley is a retractor who has helped many FMSF families. She |
| has recently become a consultant for a company that has developed |
| a computer program that could help families write their histories: |
| Heritage Makers. She thought that there may be families who have |
| not written all the things that they want their lost children, and |
| especially their grandchildren, to know, and that this could be a |
| way for them to get started. Laura said "I know that there are |
| lots of people who do not use computers. But someone in the family |
| probably does. I have written the life story of my parents from |
| birth through their marriage, children and grandchildren, for |
| example." |
| |
| If you are interested in more information about this, contact |
| Laura at: http://www.laurapasleyscreativecorner.com. To see some |
| examples go to "project search" and put "Pasley" for the author. |
| You can also call her at 972-557-6709 or by email: |
| lepasley@sbcglobal.net |
+--------------------------------------------------------------------+
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PROPOSING MARRIAGE TO A PEPSI MACHINE
Seamon, J.G., Philbin, M.M., Harrison, L.G. (2006).
Do you remember proposing marriage to the Pepsi machine?
False recollections from a campus walk.
Psycho-nomic Bulletin & Review, 13(5), 752-756.
Could you make someone believe that he or she had gotten down on one
knee and proposed marriage to a Pepsi machine? Readers who doubt that
this is possible will be especially intrigued by the results of a
recent study. This study extends previous research on imagination
inflation by showing that false recollections can occur in real-life
settings. In 1996, Garry et al. showed that just imagining events from
one's past can affect memory for childhood events. [1] Later research
showed that the effect worked even with bizarre events, but most
studies on the topic were done in research laboratories. Seamon et
al. tested participants' memory for familiar or bizarre actions that
were imagined or performed while the participants were taking long
walks in familiar places on the campus of Wesleyan University.
The researchers selected 72 locations that were both indoors and
outdoors such as a Pepsi machine in a lounge, the front stairs of the
Psychology Building or a dictionary in the main library. In each place
they provided a familiar action and a bizarre action that would later
be associated with that place such as "Check the Pepsi machine for
change," and "Get down on one knee and propose marriage to the
machine." The experimenter read one action at each of the 72 stops and
participants either watched the experimenter perform it, imagined
themselves performing it, or imagined the experimenter performing it.
Participants took two walks to some locations.
The results showed that imagining familiar or bizarre actions during
the campus walk could lead to later false recollections of having
performed the actions. The effect of imagining was just as strong with
one walk as with two. "Apparently, one vivid imagining during a walk
that focuses on the perceptual or sensory details of the image is
enough to sometimes establish a false recollection."
1. Garry, M. Manning, C.G., Loftus, E.F. (1996)
Imagination inflation: Imagining a childhood events inflates
confidence that it occurred.
Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 3(2), 208-214.
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WHAT IS KNOWN ABOUT RECOVERED MEMORIES?
Smith, S. M., & Gleaves, D. H. (2006).
Recovered memories.
In M. P. Toglia, J. D. Read, D. F. Ross, & R. C. L. Lindsay
(Eds.), The Handbook of Eyewitness Psychology. Vol I:
Memory for Events. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Review by Kimberly Wade
In a new chapter titled "Recovered memories," Steven Smith and David
Gleaves (hereafter, S&G) discuss the latest research investigating how
the brain might repress and recover information. Few chapters have
reviewed the recent literature on long-term forgetting, so we were
interested to see what this paper might offer. The chapter begins with
a brief review of Freud and Janet's role in the study of amnesia and
repression. Next, the authors clearly define some psychological jargon
including the terms repression, suppression, normal forgetting,
amnesia, trauma, discovered memories and so on. To be defined as a
recovered memory, S&G posit that three conditions must be met: [1] an
event or episode must be successfully encoded,[2] the memory must be
inaccessible for a period of time, and [3] the memory must return to
consciousness sometime after the period of inaccessibility. The
authors note that "To some, the term 'recovered memory' also suggests
that: 1) The events in question were traumatic, 2) Repression was the
cause of temporary inaccessibility, and 3) Unconscious processes work
to repress and recover lost memories of trauma." The authors then go
on to report up-to-the-minute research from the long-term forgetting
literature, including Michael Anderson and colleagues' work on
retrieval induced forgetting -- experiments that show not thinking
about words can impair one's memory for those words -- and Steven
Smith and colleagues' research into interference and cued-recall-
experiments that build upon Anderson et al.'s by showing that
forgetting effects are sometimes reversible (i.e., forgotten words can
be retrieved) when appropriate memory cues are provided. S&G outline
some of the clinical issues surrounding recovered memories, including
the theory behind modern trauma treatment and the use of "memory work"
in recovering long-forgotten memories of abuse. Finally, the authors
list some frequently asked questions about repressed and recovered
memories, and report the current consensus among psychological
scientists on each of these questions. For example, they ask:
ARE TRAUMATIC MEMORIES SPECIAL?
CONSENSUS: Most, but not all, would agree that memories of traumatic
experiences differ from non-traumatic experiences.
DISAGREEMENTS: Whereas some maintain that natural coping mechanisms,
such as repression and dissociation, routinely act to protect people
from re-experiencing traumatic memories, others believe that
emotional experiences, including traumatic ones, are unlikely to be
forgotten.
S&G's chapter provides a well-written and interesting review of how
laboratory research into long-term forgetting might apply to real
world cases of forgotten trauma. Indeed, the authors tackle important
theoretical questions (e.g., What contributions has the research made
to repressed memory theory and what are the implications for future
research?) and applied questions (e.g., How does the research advance
our understanding of a psychological problem and what are the
implications for policy?). The authors, however, fail to discuss some
of the limitations of the research they describe; research they claim
might account for how the brain ejects and then claims back traumatic
information. They also fail to mention some important, recent findings
in the literature that have brought us closer to understanding
recovered memories. Since it is important to understand what memory
scientists really know about recovered memories when debating this
topic, we thought it would be good to outline some of the problems
with S&G's chapter in the FMSF newsletter.
What does the long-term forgetting
literature say about repression?
S&G describe two programs of research that they believe can tell us
about the mechanisms underlying repression and recovered memories,
respectively. The first line of research is that of Michael Anderson
and colleagues [1,2] at the University of Oregon. The central question
in this research was whether individuals would be more likely to
forget word pairs that they are instructed not to think about than
word pairs that the are instructed to think about. In the Anderson
studies, subjects typically participate in a three-stage experiment.
First, they learn 40 word pairs (e.g., ordeal, roach) well enough to
be able to report the second "target" word (roach) when only the first
word (ordeal) is given. Next, subjects watch a cue from each pair
(ordeal) appear on a computer screen. When the cue appears, subjects
are instructed either to remember the corresponding target word (to
think about roach), or to suppress the corresponding word (do not
think about roach). Finally, subjects take a memory test in which they
are given the first word cues and their task is to recall each target
word. The results have shown that being asked to remember words
improves memory for those words, and sometimes being asked to suppress
words impairs memory for those words. Anderson and colleagues, and
others, have claimed that these results support a "suppression
mechanism," similar to that proposed by Freud over a century ago.
The second line of research comes from Steven Smith's lab at Texas A&M
University.[3] Smith and colleagues have attempted to extend
Anderson's findings by investigating how forgetting might be reversed
in the laboratory, that is, how forgotten words might be recovered
once again. In the Smith studies, subjects take part in a four-stage
experiment. In the first stage, they learn 21 lists of words, such as,
lists of fish, tools, sports and so on. Three of the lists are crucial
and the remaining 18 lists are just fillers. In the second stage, the
subjects are split into two groups: the Forget group views the filler
lists several more times, whereas the Control group does nothing. In
the third stage, subjects are asked to recall the original 21 lists.
The results of this memory test typically reveal that Forget subjects
are less likely than Control subjects to remember the critical lists
. It is presumed that rehearsing the filler lists interferes with
Forget subjects' ability to remember the critical lists. In the final
stage, subjects are given yet another memory test, but this time those
individuals who have forgotten the critical lists are provided with
the category name (e.g., "fish") to jog their memories. The results
show that these memory cues enable Forget subjects to recall the
critical lists once again and to perform just as well as Control
subjects. Smith and colleagues urge caution in generalizing their
results to recovered memories of trauma, but they claim that the
method may prove useful for learning about such phenomena.
What can the Anderson and Smith studies tell us about repressed and
recovered memories? According to S&G, these experiments might help us
to understand how the brain represses and recovers emotion-laden,
personal information. Indeed, S&G state that the Anderson research
provides "considerable evidence of forgetting that is explainable by a
inhibitory forgetting mechanism" and the Smith research "produces a
very large and robust recovered memory effect." But does this research
really show us how the brain represses years or even decades of
brutalization before recovering it in a mostly pristine form?
According to many prominent scientists, there are several reasons why
long-term forgetting experiments like Anderson and Smith's cannot
explain repressed and recovered memories. First, the rate of forgetting
in these studies is small at best. In writing about the Anderson study,
Garry and Loftus [4] noted that the suppression effect appears to be
tiny. Even when subjects are instructed to suppress words they still
remember approximately 80% of them, and this recall rate barely differs
from the recall rate of words that subjects are instructed to remember.
Such a minuscule effect cannot explain massive repression. S&G do
acknowledge this problem, "such effects... do not seem to account for
the magnitude of forgetting effects one might associate with repression
or amnesia." Second, a prominent research group at Washington
University has failed to replicate Anderson's findings, despite
numerous attempts to do so. In a forthcoming paper in Memory &
Cognition, John Bulevich and colleagues [5] describe how they attempted
to find a suppression effect in three separate experiments, but despite
their efforts they failed to do so. Third, one problem that applies to
the Anderson research but not the Smith research is that the
suppression experiments do not show memory recovery, that is, they may
demonstrate forgetting or inaccessible memories, but they do not
demonstrate memory retrieval. The Smith research addresses this concern
but their findings are not all that surprising. Memory scientists have
known for several decades that retrieval cues improve memory. Another
problem with the Smith research involves the criterion for recovering a
memory. To be considered as recovering a memory, all subjects needed to
do was recall one member of a critical list. In other words, subjects
were only required to recall 1/12 of the target event to be categorized
as presenting a recovered memory. Finally, even if these repression and
recovery effects exist, we still have to wonder, what, if anything, can
suppression and cued-retrieval effects tell us about banishing
traumatic experiences? Since the emergence of the suppressed memory
research, some memory scientists such as Daniel Schacter [6] and John
Kilhstrom [7], have expressed their skepticism about generalizing
suppression effects to repressed memories. At this stage, we do not
know, but it is of course possible that such effects are restricted to
memories for mundane words or peripheral details in pallid events. If
so, the suppression literature tells us little about the mechanisms
responsible for repressed and recovered memories.
What do we know about memory recovery in therapy?
Towards the end of the chapter, S&G discuss some of the clinical
aspects of recovered memories. In particular, they discuss whether
memories that are recovered in therapy are likely to be the result of
questionable therapeutic techniques. To address this issue, S&G cite
research by Leavitt [8] that showed that recovered memories were less
likely to occur in psychotherapy, and when they do occur in therapy,
recovered memories are often additional memories recovered while
working on continuously remembered experiences. S&G concluded that
Leavitt's results "obviously do not support the position that
suggestibility is responsible for reports of recovered memories."
Interestingly, since S&G's chapter went to print last year, new
research by Elke Geraerts [9] and colleagues at Maastricht University
has provided evidence that memories retrieved in therapy are less
likely to be accurate than memories retrieved outside of therapy. The
Geraerts study found that discontinuous memories of childhood abuse
were more likely to be corroborated by other individuals if they were
recalled outside therapy rather than in therapy. In fact, Geraerts and
colleagues failed to find any corroborative evidence for the 16 abuse
cases that participants recalled in therapy, but they were able to
verify 37% of cases that participants recalled outside therapy. The
Geraerts research shows that memories recovered in therapy may differ
in important ways to those recovered outside therapy.
How does the false memory literature fit into a
discussion about recovered memories?
We were surprised to see that the S&G chapter completely ignores the
massive body of research that shows individuals can come to
confidently believe and remember significant events that never
happened. In a previous paper, Gleaves [10] claimed, "when people
misremember, what they do remember is likely to be consistent with
their existing schemas or perhaps with their actual experiences." In
other words, Gleaves seems to believe that people rarely develop false
memories of implausible events. Now, if this were true, would subjects
in false memory studies come to believe or remember witnessing an
individual being possessed,[11] rubbing chalk all over their own
head,[12] or proposing marriage to a Pepsi machine? [13] The answer
is, probably not.
[1] Anderson, M. C., & Green, C. (2001). Suppressing unwanted memories
by executive control. Nature, 410, 366-369.
[2] Anderson, M. C., & Spellman, B. A. (1995). On the status of
inhibitory mechanisms in cognition: Memory retrieval as a model
case. Psychological Review, 102, 68-100.
[3] Smith, S. M. et al. (2003). Eliciting and comparing false and
recovered memories: An experimental approach. Applied Cognitive
Psychology, 17, 251-279.
[4] Garry, A., & Loftus, E. F. (2004). I am Freud's Brain. Skeptical
Inquirer, 28, 16-18.
[5] Bulevich, J. B., Roediger, H. L., Balota, D. A., & Butler,
A. C. (In press). Failures to find suppression of episodic
memories in the think/no-think paradigm. Memory & Cognition.
[6] Schacter, D. L. (2001). Suppression of unwanted memories:
repression revisited? The Lancet, 357, 1724-1725.
[7] Kihlstrom, J. F. (2002). No need for repression [comment on
"Inhibitory processes and the control of memory retrieval" by
B. J. Levy & M. C. Anderson]. Trends in Cognitive Science, 6:
502.
[8] Leavitt, F (1997). False attribution of suggestibility to explain
recovered memory of childhood sexual abuse following extended
amnesia. Child Abuse & Neglect, 21, 265-272.
[9] Geraerts, E., Schooler, J. W., Merckelbach, H., Jelicic, M.,
Hauer, B. J. A., & Ambadar, Z. (In press). The reality of
recovered memories: Corroborating continuous and discontinuous
memories of childhood sexual abuse. Psychological Science.
[10] Gleaves, D. H., (2006). Dialectical repression
theory. Behavioural and Brain Sciences, 29, 520-521.
[11] Mazzoni, G. A. L., Loftus, E. F., & Kirsch, I. (2001). Changing
beliefs about implausible autobiographical events: A little
plausibility goes a long way. Journal of Experimental Psychology:
Applied, 7, 51-59.
[12] Thomas, A. K., Bulevich, J. B., & Loftus, E. F. (2003). Exploring
the role of repetition and sensory elaboration in the imagination
inflation effect. Memory & Cognition, 31, 630-640.
[13] Seamon, J. G., Philbin, M. M., & Harrison, L. G. (2006). Do you
remember proposing marriage to the Pepsi machine? False
recollections from a campus walk. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review,
13, 752-756.
Dr. Kimberly Wade is an Assistant Professor of Psychology at the
University of Warwick (UK). Dr Wade's research on human memory
distortions has appeared in many international journals and has been
presented at both national and international conferences.
The FMSF will welcome a response from Smith & Gleaves.
**********************************************************************
DOES TRAUMA AFFECT CHILDREN'S BASIC MEMORY PROCESSES
Howe, M.L., Toth, S.L. & Cicchetti, D. (2006).
Memory and developmental psychopathology. In D. Cicchetti &
D. Cohen (Eds.), Developmental psychopathology: Developmental
Neuroscience 2nd Ed., Vol. 2, pp. 629-655. New York: Wiley.
Howe, M.L., Cicchetti, D., Toth, S.L. (2006).
Children's basic memory processes, stress, and maltreatment.
Development and Psychopathology, 18, 759-769.
There are theoretical reasons to think that stress, especially caused
by early childhood experiences such as maltreatment, would produce
changes in the basic memory processes (encoding, storage, retrieval,
and retention) of developing children. In the articles above, Howe and
colleagues survey the research literature to test that assumption.
They examine studies of memory of normal children that provide them
with a baseline against which they can compare memory processes of
children who have been traumatized. The authors observe that their
work shows that it is extremely difficult to find any evidence that
the chronic stress of child abuse adversely affects children's basic
memory processes. The research shows that the basic memory processes
of maltreated children do not differ reliably from that of
non-maltreated children.
For example, some researchers have suggested that children who have
PTSD should have poorer memories than children who do not. However,
studies have shown that children's memory performance is not related
to a clinician's diagnosis of PTSD. Researchers have suggested that
children who dissociate should have poorer memories than children who
do not. Although dissociation has been considered a way that a child
copes with a traumatic experience, dissociation should also limit the
amount of information that the child encodes during the event or
isolate the traumatic memories after the event thus making it
difficult for the child to access the memory. Yet, Howe et al. note
"children as young as 3 years of age who were the victims of
maltreatment and scored high on measures of dissociation actually had
more detailed memories of their abuse than did children who scored low
on dissociation." (Howe, Cicchetti, & Toth p. 763)
Howe et al. show repeatedly that the research fails to support some of
the more familiar theories. For example, Betrayal Trauma Theory argues
that children who are abused by caretakers or parents are more likely
to have amnesia for their abuse because children need to maintain
their attachment to the abusers in order to survive. It is the status
of the abuser that determines whether a child forgets, not the number
of times the child is abused. However, all the evidence shows that
abuse tends to be remembered. Indeed, there were no incest survivors
who had ever forgotten their abuse in Russell's (1999) epidemiologic
study. Goodman et al. (2003) found that there was no relationship
between the status of the abuser and a failure to report abuse years
later. "There is little or no support for the idea that incest
survivors experience amnesia for their abuse." (Howe, Toth & Cicchetti
p. 636)
The argument that "the body remembers" abuse also lacks empirical
evidence. Van der Kolk has argued that the stress hormones released
during trauma create state-dependent memories of the event that are
not accessible to explicit memory. He argues that these memories are
not subject to the same deterioration as other memories and they may
return spontaneously in flashbacks, dreams, or body memories. However,
Howe et al. point out that the stress hormones do not prevent
declarative memories from being formed; indeed, they enhance the
consolidation of the abuse memories. In addition, there is no evidence
that someone with state-dependent memories would be amnesic for
it. And Howe et al. note:
"Even if implicit memories did return as bodily sensations,
unexplained feelings, and flashbacks, there is nothing in implicit
memory traces that reveal their source. That is, such traces do not
contain information that indexes their origin, and hence it is
impossible to use them to accurately re-create the original
experience.... Moreover, such memories are not stored in muscle
tissue -- the idea of "body memories" is inconsistent with the
cognitive neuroscience of memory, even the neuroscience of traumatic
memories... In fact, animal research has shown that there is no
such thing as indelibly etched emotional memories." (Howe, Toth &
Cicchetti p. 637)
Howe et al. note that research about trauma and memory is in its
infancy. They suggest that future studies should be conducted on people
who have actually experienced trauma and not extrapolated from normal
populations. Future studies should be longitudinal and the tests more
sensitive. They write "until that time, the studies reviewed here
provide no rationale for the claim that basic memory processes or their
development conform to a different set of rules for maltreated children
than other, non-maltreated children." (Howe, Toth & Cicchetti p. 766)
______________________________SIDEBAR_______________________________
/ \
| A paradox awaits them [retractors]. On the one hand, their |
| distress warrants professional help; on the other, they have lost |
| trust in mental health professionals and are thrown back into |
| their own resources at a time when their coping skills have been |
| undermined by recovered memory therapy. For these patients, |
| perhaps we should create a new definition of PTSD-'Post Therapy |
| Stress Disorder.'" |
| Lief, HI & Fetkewicz, JM. (1997) |
| Construction of false memory syndrome: |
| A transactional model |
| Psychological Inquiry, 8. 303-306 |
\____________________________________________________________________/
**********************************************************************
UTAH'S LICENSE BOARD INVESTIGATES BARBARA SNOW
On January 12, 2007, Utah's Professional Licensing division filed an
action against Barbara W. Snow. The discipline notice alleges that
Snow has been unprofessional in her conduct and has violated a number
of Utah codes as well as the National Association of Social Workers
Code of Ethics. No date is set for a hearing.
Barbara Snow's name may be familiar to many FMSF Newsletter readers.
In addition to a number of legal cases in which judges have criticized
her techniques,[1] Snow was a coauthor of some papers from the early
1990s that were highly influential. One paper helped to fuel the
satanic ritual abuse scare [2] and another was often cited as the way
in which children disclosed sexual abuse.[3] A recent critique of
these papers included a quote from a judge in one of the legal cases
in which Snow played a critical role:[4]
Indeed, Dr. Snow herself admitted that she used interrogation
procedures that were not intended to sift truth from error. She
forthrightly admitted she was not a neutral interviewer; rather she
was "an ally for the child," "biased," and not a fact collector like
the police.... She also testified in effect that there was nothing
in her methods that served as a standard for determining the
truthfulness of the stories she produced by her interrogation....
But since she starts an interrogation with the assumption that abuse
occurred, she then proceeds to prove that point.... In short, any
claim that scientific principles or Dr. Snow's own expertise and
experience validated her conclusions and procedures is devastatingly
refuted by her own statement, "I didn't believe any of those kids
when they told me it didn't happen." (State v. Bullock, 1989,
p. 175) reprinted in London et al. (2005).
According to the Salt Lake Tribune [5] the complaint against Snow also
states "when state investigators questioned Snow, she allegedly
provided them with made-up notes about those sessions." In addition,
the complaint noted, "on one occasion, Snow went to [a] woman's house
and used a baseball bat to destroy computer equipment and other
property she had taken there at an earlier time."
We will watch for developments in the Barbara Snow case. Many families
were surely harmed needlessly by her zealotry over the past 17
years. It has taken a long time for the license board to take
notice. Will the board take firm action now?
[1] For example: State v Bullock, 791 P.2d 155 (Utah 1989). State v
Hadfield, 788 P.2d 506 (Utah 1990).
[2] Snow, B. & Sorensen, T. (1990) Ritualistic child abuse in a
neighborhood setting. Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 5(4),
474-487.
[3] Sorensen, T & Snow, B. (1991). How children tell: The process of
disclosure in child sexual abuse. Child Welfare, 70(1), 3-15.
[4] London, K., Bruck, M., Ceci, S.J. & Shuman, D.W. (2005).
Disclosure of child sexual abuse. What does the research tell us
about the ways that children tell? Psychology, Public Policy, and
Law, 11(1), 194-226.
[5] Rosetta, L. (2007, January 20). Therapist under
investigation. Salt Lake Tribune retrieved January 21, 2007 from
wwww.sltrib.com/news/ci_5051155.
+----------------------------------------+
| "Nothing fixes a thing so intensely in |
| the memory as the wish to forget it." |
| Montaigne |
+----------------------------------------+
**********************************************************************
THE REPRESSED MEMORIES CHALLENGE
Pope, H.G., Poliakoff, M.B., Parker, M.P., Boynes, N., Hudson, J.I.
Is dissociative amnesia a culture-bound syndrome?
Findings from a survey of historical literature.
Psychological Medicine, 37, 225-233. (2007)
In the May/June 2006 FMSF Newsletter, we printed Harrison Pope and
colleague's offer of $1,000 to the first person who could find an
example in written works published before 1800 of a description of a
person who had a repressed memory caused by a traumatic event.
Specifically, the investigators sought a case where an individual
experienced a severe traumatic event, then was unable to remember it
for a period of months or years and then "recovered" the memory. The
authors suggested that "natural human psychological phenomena, such as
depression, anxiety, delusions, hallucinations and dementia" have been
documented in both fiction and non-fiction throughout history. If
dissociative amnesia were a natural human psychological phenomenon, it
too should be noted. Although the researchers were aware of many
examples of repressed memories in published works after 1800 such as
Rudyard Kipling's novel, Captains Courageous, and many contemporary
movies such as Batman Forever, Prince of Tides, and The Bad Seed, they
were not aware of mention of repressed memories in works published
prior to 1800.
The authors observed that powerful new internet search engines and
greatly expanded databases now offer the opportunity for searches into
even obscure works. With their challenge they hoped to put many people
to work looking for examples. Pope and his colleagues advertised the
challenge in three languages on more than 30 Internet sites. Although
the challenge generated more than 100 responses, no one came up with
an example that met the researchers' criteria.
Pope et al. discuss four hypotheses that might explain the findings.
The first is that dissociative amnesia is a natural phenomenon that
has been portrayed in literature but that the searches failed to find
examples. Since it is almost impossible to prove a negative, this
hypothesis cannot be totally abandoned, but, the authors note, that
given the widespread nature of the search, it is an unlikely
explanation.
The second hypothesis is that dissociative amnesia has always been
present but that no one wrote about it before 1800, or if they
observed it, they interpreted it differently from us. The authors
think this is unlikely since other phenomena such as depression,
anxiety, etc. were all described. Even though writers before 1800 had
different views of delusions and hallucinations, the early
descriptions are identifiable. The authors noted that experiencing a
horrible trauma such as being raped or seeing family members killed
and then being unable to remember afterwards is such a graphic
phenomenon that a description would be recognizable even if our
ancestors had no psychological conception of what they witnessed. The
absence of any such description prior to 1800, therefore, cannot be
explained simply by saying that our ancestors could not understand the
phenomenon.
The third hypothesis is that dissociative amnesia is a natural
phenomenon but did not afflict people until the last 200 years. The
authors argue that if dissociative amnesia represented an innate
ability, our ancestors would also have shown it. If a modern child
could openly "repress" a memory of being sexually abused without being
"taught" how to do it, then a child in Elizabethan England or
classical Greece presumably would have been able to do the same
thing. The authors note that modern individuals would not have some
"unique claim to a special brand of trauma that our predecessors never
experienced."
The authors concluded that by default, therefore, one is left only
with a fourth hypothesis, namely that that dissociative amnesia is not
an "innate, naturally occurring phenomenon but rather a product of
modern Western culture." Pope et al. speculate that it flourished
because it occupied a fertile niche in the culture.
Describing something as a "culture-specific syndrome" does not mean
that it is imaginary or that people are malingering. A
culture-specific syndrome shows how people's minds can decide that
symptoms are connected and shows how a particular society defines
disease. People suffer equally in naturally occurring or
culture-specific syndromes.
Pope et al. suggest that dissociative amnesia could better be
classified with other "conversion disorders," a term essentially
synonymous with pseudoneurological conditions that lack a neurological
base. They observe that classifying dissociative amnesia as a
conversion disorder would bring the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual
of the American Psychiatric Association into congruence with the
existing International Classification of Diseases, 10th Ed., which is
the international counterpart to the DSM IV.
The article has generated a good amount of publicity. Some proponents
of the reality of recovered memories claim that the criteria used by
Pope are not right, but most comments have been favorable. Harvard
psychologist Richard McNally indicated that the implication of the
Pope et al. study is that therapists should focus attention on
treating patients for the symptoms that they show, such as depression,
rather that assuming that hidden memories are the source of the
patient's problems. A copy of this paper is available at:
www.biopsychlab.com
______________________________SIDEBAR_______________________________
/ \
| "An ever shrinking group of therapists is still recovering hidden |
| memories of incest from, or creating multiple personalities in |
| their troubled clients. A Netherlands observer of the recovered |
| memory scene, Hans Crombag, a forensic psychologist at Maastricht |
| University, referred to this remnant as 'The Dissociation Circuit |
| -- sloppy thinkers whose dangerous psychological theories resonate |
| in naïve circles.' [1] The trouble is that these therapists often |
| work with very troubled clients, whose serious problems are |
| further aggravated by their mentors' misguided ministrations." |
| Adriaan Mak |
| Joost Niemoller, J. (1996). The dissociation circut |
| De Groene Amsterdammer, 127, (16), 16-24 |
| Available: www.groene.nl/1996/17/jn_cromb.html |
| English translation available: |
| www.ipce.info/library_3/files/dissociation.html |
\____________________________________________________________________/
**********************************************************************
DOES TRAUMA CAUSE DISSOCIATIVE SYMPTOMS?
Merckelbach, H. & Muris, P. (2001)
The causal link between self-reported trauma and dissociation:
a critical review. Behav-iour Research and Therapy, 39, 245-254.
This paper examines the relationship between traumatic experiences and
dissociative symptoms. In much of the clinical literature it is
assumed that dissociative symptoms are caused by a traumatic
experience. It is common to read that a child dissociates as a way of
surviving the trauma of sexual abuse. The authors note that the
primary source of evidence for this view comes from studies that used
both self-reports and scores on the Dissociative Experience Scale
(DES).
The authors evaluated what they considered to be the very best studies
in the field. They noted that some of the studies do not support any
kind of robust linkage between trauma and dissociation. They also
noted that some studies found that there is not a direct causal link
between trauma and dissociation but rather show evidence that there
may be another variable such as family pathology that is involved.
Most important, they found that the "studies cited as evidence for the
idea that trauma causes dissociation often relied on the DES." The
authors note that the measure of dissociation overlaps with
personality features such as fantasy proneness and that this may
"compromise the accuracy of retrospective self-reports of trauma."
The authors conclude that those personality features associated with
dissociation (fantasy proneness, heightened suggestibility, and
susceptibility to pseudomemories) may promote a positive response bias
to retrospective self-reports of traumatic experience. It is possible
that dissociation encourages self-reported traumatic experiences, just
the opposite of the common belief.
+--------------------------------------------------------------------+
| CORRECTION |
| |
| As current chairperson of the Australian organisation ASCA |
| (Advocates for Survivors of Child Abuse) it has been brought to my |
| attention that there has been mention in your newsletter (Nov/Dec |
| 06, Vol. 15, No. 6) of the article about Liz Mullinar and |
| Mayumarri (Christian Healing Centre in New South Wales, |
| Australia), which was written by Richard Guilliat and published in |
| the Australian Weekend Magazine in September 2006. |
| |
| Because you presented the information in this article as relating |
| to ASCA, I would like to clarify for your readers the fact that, |
| although ASCA was founded originally by Liz Mullinar, ASCA and |
| Mayumarri have been completely separate organizations-legally and |
| financially-since 2003. |
| |
| The article referred to in your newsletter related to activities |
| at Mayumarri alone, and had no relevance to ASCA. |
| Thank you, |
| Bev McCallum, ASCA Chair |
| Email: bmccallum@asca.org.au |
+--------------------------------------------------------------------+
**********************************************************************
GROWING UP WITH A MOM OBSESSED BY SATANIC CULTS
Bishop, B. (2007, February 13). Overcoming child trauma.
The Register-Guard, p. 1.
(Many families have written to the Foundation to ask what happens to
the children of people who believe they were abused in satanic cults.
A recent article tells about one such person.)
Hannah Caron was studying psychology at the University of Oregon when
a paper was published claiming a link between adverse experiences in
childhood and certain illnesses, addiction and suicide.[1] Caron
joined a project to help others recover from painful childhood
trauma. [2]
Ms. Caron had a traumatic childhood as "the only child of a mentally
ill woman." Caron's mother believed that she and her daughter had been
involved in ritual abuse. The mother was convinced that they had been
brainwashed by a cult that still pursued them. As a result, Caron and
her mother moved at least 52 times in 15 years, sometimes living on
the streets. Caron was in and out of foster homes. She ran away when
she was a freshman in high school when she realized that her mother
might be seriously mentally ill. She lived on the street and began
using drugs. After having been committed to a mental hospital where
she received treatment, Caron was helped by friends and distant family
members and was able to go on with her life.
As for the ritual abuse, Caron says "It never wasn't true for me..."
"It always was a component of my life. She wasn't able to function
because of her fears." Caron still has nightmares and she wonders, if
any of her mother's beliefs were true. But she says "I no longer live
in a constant state of fear."
Caron currently works as part of a treatment team with severely abused
children. She also teaches self-defense and expects to get her
psychology degree this year.
[1] Adverse Childhood Experiences Study. See www.acestudy.org
[2] Trauma Healing Project. See http://www.healingattention.org
According to the article, the head of the Trauma Healing Project,
Elaine Walters, said that "SOME PEOPLE USE ALCOHOL TO KEEP FROM
RELIVING EXPERIENCES THAT THEY MAY NOT EVEN CONSCIOUSLY REMEMBER."
(Emphasis added.)
______________________________SIDEBAR_______________________________
/ \
| THE ADVERSE CHILDHOOD EXPERIENCES STUDY. |
| Reprinted from the FMS Foundation Newsletter |
| July/August 1998 Vol 7 No. 6 |
| |
| Felitti V.J., Anda R.F., Nordenberg, D., Williamson, D.F., Spitz, |
| A.M., Edwards, V., Koss, M.P., Marks, J.S. |
| Am J. Prev Med 1998;14(4) |
| |
| A questionnaire was mailed to 13,494 adults who had received |
| medical evaluations at Kaiser Permanente in San Diego with a 70.5% |
| response rate. The questionnaire contained seven categories of |
| adverse childhood experiences: (1) physical, sexual or |
| psychological abuse and (2) four measures of household |
| dysfunction: substance abuse, mental illness, suicide attempts or |
| imprisonment. A statistical analysis showed that the more |
| categories of adverse child experiences, the greater the |
| likelihood of adult multiple health risk factors. |
| |
| The adult risk factors included: smoking, severe obesity, physical |
| inactivity, depressed mood, suicide attempts, alcoholism, any drug |
| abuse, parental drug abuse, high lifetime number of sexual |
| partners and history of sexually transmitted disease. Disease |
| conditions included ischemic heart disease, cancer, stroke, |
| chronic bronchitis, emphysema, diabetes, hepatitis, and skeletal |
| fractures. |
| |
| The authors note the limitations of this study such as: self- |
| report, retrospective, and the probability that some persons with |
| disease may be more likely to report adverse childhood |
| experiences. They state that the data can "only demonstrate |
| associations between childhood exposures and health risk |
| behaviors, health status, and diseases in adulthood." |
| |
| Nevertheless, after stating the limitations, the authors slide |
| into the implication of causality. Specifically, the press release |
| states the study "suggests that child abuse and household |
| dysfunction lead to the development decades later of the chronic |
| diseases that are the most common causes of death and disability |
| in this country." (Emphasis added.) |
| |
| This is a violation of the most elementary rules taught in |
| Psychology I. The fact that A is associated with B does not permit |
| the conclusion that A leads to B. It is shocking to see an |
| elementary mistake in such a comprehensive and expensive study. |
| |
| Child abuse is wrong regardless of the consequences. Sloppy |
| science undermines the cause. |
\____________________________________________________________________/
**********************************************************************
L E G A L C O R N E R
_____________________________________________
Pittsburgh Area Man Again Convicted of Murder
Allegheny Pennsylvania County Common Pleas
(3rd U.S. Circuit Ct. of Appeals Case Nos. 03-4046 & 03-4219)
On January 23, 2007, an Allegheny County Pennsylvania Common Pleas
Court jury of 10 women and two men found Steven Slutzker, 56, guilty
of first-degree murder of the 1975 slaying of his neighbor John Mudd,
Sr. This was the second time Slutzker had been convicted of shooting
John Mudd, Sr. A jury in 1992 had also convicted Slutzker of murder.
In 2004, the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a state appeals
court decision to overturn the 1992 conviction on the grounds that
Slutzker's attorney had failed to present witnesses who said that
Slutzker was with them at the time of the murder and also that the
jury did not have an opportunity to see a police report in which a
witness said that she had seen someone other than Slutzker at the
scene of the murder. The federal court ordered Slutzker to be released
or tried again.
Testimony in the new trial began on January 11, 2007 and the primary
evidence was the recovered memory of the victim's son who was five-
years-old at the time of the murder. Mudd, Jr. testified in both
trials that in 1990 he had had a flashback of seeing Slutzker walk out
of the basement soon after his father had been shot. Mudd, Jr., now
36, testified that he did not know what had happened to his father for
the 15 years before his flashback. Mudd, Jr. also said that in his
flashback his mother had been holding him, but he had not noted that
in his previous 1992 testimony.
Under cross examination, Mudd, Jr. conceded that he had known since he
was sixteen that his father had been murdered, long before the
flashback. According to newspaper accounts, the testimony of a
Catholic Charities social worker in the first trial was presented.
That person had said that when Mudd, Jr. was 5-years-old he said "he
was going to get Steve Slutzker and kill him," when he got older.
Prosecutors told the jury that the motive for the murder was that
Slutzker, who had been having an affair with Mudd's wife, decided to
kill Mudd, Sr. after he and his wife reconciled.
The defense presented witnesses who claimed that Slutzker was with
them at the time of the murder. The prosecution, however, pointed out
that one witness had a severe alcohol problem and the other admitted
that his failing health had caused memory problems. The defense also
pointed out a number of other discrepancies such as the lack of
Slutzker's footprints in the snow at the time of the murder. The
prosecutor said the footprints could have been blown away.
The jury deliberated 8 hours and according to one jury member they
"didn't convict on any one thing, but how it all fit together." After
the verdict, Slutzker yelled, "I'm innocent. Are you paying
attention?" Slutzker received a life sentence.
The Allegheny County Chief Deputy District Attorney was Daniel
E. Fitzsimmons. David S. Shrager of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
represented Steven Slutzker, and Common Pleas Judge Jeffrey A. Manning
presided.
The Innocence Institute of Point Park University has written about
the Slutzker case and the article can be found at:
www.pointpark.edu/default.aspx?id=1276.
Kerlik, B., Reilly, R.B. (2007, January 23). Wilkinsburg man
convicted 2nd time in '75 'total recall' killing. Pittsburgh
Tribune-Review. Retrieved January 24, 2007 from
www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/today/print_490003.html.
Moushey, B. (2007, January 23). Murder suspect's alibi: He was
passed out drunk. Post-Gazette.com. Retrieved on January 23, 2007
from www.jpost-gazette.com/pg/pp/07023/756056.stm.
____________________________________________________
Canadian Supreme Court Bars Hypnosis-based Testimony
R. v. Trochym 2007 SCC6, Supreme Court of Canada,
Docket 30717, Feb. 1, 2007.
Decision available at:
scc.lexum.umontreal.ca/en/2007/2007scc6/2007scc6.html
In February, 2007, in a 6-3 ruling the Canadian Supreme Court said
that the practice of using evidence from witnesses who have been
hypnotized is scientifically and legally unreliable and should not be
allowed in criminal trials. This appears to make Canada the first
country that is based in the tradition of English criminal-law to
place a total ban on hypnotically enhanced evidence. Police can still
use hypnosis as investigative tool but they must have corroboration
that is admissible in court.
Justice Marie Deschamps wrote for the majority that included Beverley
McLachlin, Ian Binnie, Louis LeBel and Morris Fish and Justice Louise
Charron. "Although hypnosis has been the subject of numerous studies,
these studies are either inconclusive or draw attention to the fact
that hypnosis can, in certain circumstances, result in the distortion
of memory."
Dissenting were Justices Michel Bastarache, Rosalie Abella and
Marshall Rothstein who wrote: "These sorts of potential frailties with
memory, whether ordinary or hypnotically refreshed, are those that
juries are quite capable of weighing."
In the United States, the use of hypnotically enhanced evidence varies
from state to state. In 2006, New Jersey joined 26 states that
generally exclude its use.
Tibbetts, J. (2007, February 2). Top court bars hypnosis-based
testimony. Montreal Gazette, A10.
**********************************************************************
F R O M O U R R E A D E R S
___________
Giving Back
Our daughter, "Dee," recanted in July 2006, eight years after accusing
her grandfather (my father) of satanic and sexual abuse because of his
affiliation with the Masons. When she retracted, Dee said almost
immediately that she wanted to give back in any way that she could in
an effort to make amends for the devastation that she had caused with
her accusation.
One of the professors at the Portland Bible College in Portland,
Oregon heard about Dee, and she asked her if she would be willing to
talk about the experience with her students. The students were part of
a class that was learning about counseling, and, in particular, the
techniques of counseling individuals and families. Dee readily
accepted the opportunity. It took several weeks before the time was
arranged, but finally they agreed on a date: Thursday, March 1,
2007. There were approximately 20 students present.
Dee asked her husband and me to accompany her. She said that she
wanted us to talk a little about our perspective at the end of her
presentation. It was a very emotional event for me as I listened to
her recount her experience of her "repressed memory" counseling. She
explained why she felt that she had needed counseling, how she became
involved with counselors who led her in a disastrous direction, what
brought about her turnaround, and how she came to understand that her
"memories" were never real memories at all but rather constructions of
her imagination. I was amazed at how attentive the students were
throughout the 50-minute class. They hung on her every word.
Dee explained that the book Second Thoughts by Dr. Paul Simpson was
the eye opener for her. My wife and I had given her the book to read
after we discovered what a powerful message it brought to the false
memory counseling. It took Dee a year and a half before she was
finally willing to read the book. Once she did, she recognized herself
as the exact profile of the victims who were described in the book and
realized that what she had thought was real had really been false and
had been implanted in her mind by the techniques of the counselor whom
she saw weekly for ten months.
At the end of Dee's presentation the class asked questions and thanked
her enthusiastically for taking the time to share her experience. Dee
asked them to be prepared when they become counselors to be alert for
any individuals or families who may have had experiences such as
hers. She asked them to equip themselves with ways to help families
out of such awful counseling.
I hope sharing this event with newsletter readers will give
encouragement to others that there is always hope that truth will be
found and that others who have been harmed by "repressed memory"
counseling will also find a way to return home.
We thank the FMS Foundation for its work.
A Proud Dad
______________
Accountability
In past newsletters, I have revealed my personal and professional
experience with psychiatric services gone awry, specifically the
diagnosis of MPD based on repressed memories. (See January-February
2004, Volume 13, No. 1) It is now sixteen years after my first
professional exposure to this devastation.
When I began working at a medical center in LaCrosse, WI as a
psychiatric social worker, I was appalled that women with real
neurobiological disorders (e.g. bi-polar disorder, schizophrenia) were
convinced by a psychiatrist and the therapists he trained that they
suffered from repressed memories. In fact, the psychiatrist was the
director of psychiatric services for the county. As a social worker, I
explored the experiences of these women through extensive social
histories and personal interviews. The common element they shared was
memory- retrieval therapy, often replacing pharmacological and other
therapies. The result of this treatment was often that these women
became psychotic and suicidal. If they were released from the
hospital, they would only return to the inpatient psychiatric unit,
unable to function in the outside world. But the therapists forged
ahead with their treatment plan, with the professional community doing
nothing to address the damaging therapy.
I believe that my own depressive collapse was precipitated by the
stress of the trauma and injustice I witnessed as patients
deteriorated under the treatment of this psychiatrist and the
therapists he supervised. The lack of response by the psychiatric and
social service system was alarming. The therapists who practiced
memory-retrieval therapy thought themselves 'above' case management
and 'above' treating people with severe and chronic mental illness. In
my opinion, they were poorly trained social workers that wanted to be
perceived as 'therapeutic giants.' They are directly responsible for
disempowering women, for families experiencing unspeakable anguish,
for mis-allocating the precious financial resources of county human
services, and for defrauding medicine, Medicaid and private insurance
companies.
I know of several professionals who are disillusioned with social work
and who continue to press for consequences for these therapists. At
least one practitioner of recovered-memory therapy has been reassigned
(demoted) and can no longer conduct therapy. A second therapist from
this group is still practicing but no longer does RMT. And even though
the psychiatrist in charge was eventually forced out of his position,
he simply relocated to another state and resumed practicing
psychiatry.
Many of the former patients whom I have seen in the past year are so
disconnected from family that they live isolated lives. They are back
on medication, often are viewed as 'crazy' and 'difficult' and are
sometimes shunned by professionals and others. Some have found
support, and sadly, others have died.
In my opinion, the practitioners of RMT have committed not only
immoral and unethical acts, but have also committed fraud. They did
not meet the basic standard of care and yet they got paid. They should
be held accountable.
Claudia Dabbs, MSW
__________________
A Wonderful Return
After nearly ten years of no contact, our daughter accepted an
invitation from her accused father to meet for lunch in her city. She
and I had been in sporadic touch during the previous six years, but
there had been a tacit agreement never to discuss serious family
matters, and my optimism for a breakthrough had been waning. Although
we could not know what enabled her to respond positively in this
instance, we were cautiously joyful at the prospect. Finally, the day
arrived, and she and her dad had an "ordinary" friendly visit,
chattering for a couple of hours about work and family. There was no
mention of the tragedy of the preceding decade.
Since that meeting, our entire family has been together twice, and my
husband has finally started getting to know his granddaughter. We have
at least two more family gatherings on the calendar in the coming
months. So far, these events have taken place in neutral territory,
but my husband and I look forward to a time in the future when we will
comfortably spend time in each other's homes as "normal" families do.
We do not know if we will ever discuss openly with her what happened
to our family.
The apparent return of our beloved daughter would have been much less
likely, I think, were it not for the support we have received over the
years from FMSF and from a few close friends and family members. The
latter never shut the door on our daughter, despite their
bewilderment, and occasional anger, at what was happening. Our son, in
particular, walked the fine and agonizing line of maintaining loving
relationships with us as well as with his older sister, exhibiting a
maturity beyond his years, particularly at the onset of this odyssey
when he was relatively young. Many extended family members also made
the effort to keep in positive touch with our daughter despite the
distance she put between herself and all of us and the lack of
evidence that any of their efforts were being rewarded.
For its part, the Foundation, of course, provided us with crucial
information; but it was also a source of ongoing encouragement,
especially in the "From Our Readers" section of the Newsletter. Like
many grieving parents, we often went first to those letters to look
for any shred of hope that our nightmare would eventually end. The
accounts of returning children, some after more than a decade, helped
us continue both to keep the door open to our daughter and to prevent
ourselves from drowning in sorrow, self-pity, or bitterness. Our
entire family owes a great debt to the work of the Foundation, as well
as to all the accused, returned, and retracted who have shared their
stories over the years. Thanks to each of you; and may all of our
families continue to find a path toward wholeness.
One more mom
______________________________SIDEBAR_______________________________
/ \
| HELP NEEDED |
| |
| My names Louise Turner and I am a member of the British False |
| Memory Society and am also a retractor. I am a second year |
| Sociology student at the University of Derby and I am undertaking |
| a module in research. The questionnaire aims to look at patterns |
| and trends which can be identified by those affected by the |
| existence of False Memory Syndrome on either a personal or |
| professional level. The questionnaire is suitable for anyone who |
| has dealt with False Memory Syndrome. |
| |
| This questionnaire is completly confidential and all data will be |
| anonymised prior to being placed onto a database for use within my |
| research only. Any names used in my final research paper will be |
| changed to protect your anonymity. You can withdraw from this |
| study at any point and do not have to give a reason unless you |
| wish to do so. If you would like a copy of the report at the end |
| please provide at least one contact option where I can send you a |
| copy via mail, email or fax. These contact details will be removed |
| from your answers to the questionnaire to ensure confidenitality |
| is upheld at all times. |
| Thank you. |
| Louise Turner |
| c/o Rebecca Barnes, |
| Sociology, Education, Health and Sciences |
| University of Derby |
| Kedleston Road, Derby, DE22 1 GB |
| L.Turner5@student.derby.ac.uk |
| To take the survey, go to: |
| www.studentlou.com/study.htm |
| The link to my own story about false memory is: |
| www.studentlou.com/anightmaretoomany.htm |
| |
| If you do not have access to a computer but would still like to |
| complete the survey, write to the FMSF and we will send you a |
| copy. |
\____________________________________________________________________/
**********************************************************************
THE PASSING OF RAY SOUZA
By Frank Kane
For most of us, the first time we knew of Ray Souza was on or about
April 19, 1993, when he and Shirley stared out at us from the cover of
the national magazine, Newsweek. The picture was an unflattering one
and the story headline even more startling. It read, "CHILD ABUSE: A
court found the Souzas guilty of molesting their grandchildren. They
cry 'Witchhunt.' When does the fight to protect our kids go too far?"
In many subsequent news articles over the years, Ray and Shirley
became simply the "grandparents from Lowell," and we all knew to whom
the article referred.
Judge Elizabeth Dolan, now retired, convicted them in a bench trial on
the typical, spurious "evidence" coerced from their grandchildren,
e.g.; "attacks by machines as big as a room, forced to drink green
potions, locked in cages in the basement of their Lowell home." A
doctor from Boston Children's Hospital, with no hard copy of anything
in her possession, gave evidence that she saw some anomaly in a
child's anal medical exam, two years previous to her current testimony
(the anomaly, it turned out, was within the range of "normal,"
according to a subsequent study the doctor herself submitted to a
medical journal).
Dolan assigned Shirley and Ray to house arrest, pending appeals.
Further legal actions took place over the years, the most notable
being a turn-down by the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, which
told the Souzas that, even though their constitutional rights were
violated by the lack of face-to-face confrontation, their trial was
still a fair trial. In the very same week in November, 1995, the
Massachusetts Department of Corrections had to ship 299 inmates to
jails in Texas because of overcrowding, Assistant District Attorney.
Martha Coakley attempted to have the Souzas removed from their home
and incarcerated, separately, in the same overcrowded institutions.
Dolan demurred from doing so.
In fact, the Souzas remained in their home for a total of nine years,
able to leave only to go once a week to church and, with prior
permission, to medical appointments. Shirley's sister, Eleanor,
shopped for food, clothing, and household needs every week for those
nine years, a true labor of love.
We all know now that Judge Dolan adamantly refused to allow testimony
(with no objection raised by their lawyer, Robert George), from the
Souzas' youngest, unmarried daughter, the source of the initial
recovered repressed memory of her childhood sexual abuse, incidentally
"disclosed" in a nightmare of being raped by her father with a
crucifix. This daughter then informed her married sister and sister-
in-law that their children were probably also being molested by Mom
and Dad. Hysteria ensued.
>From that point on, the case went from one of repressed-memory
recovery to the interrogation of the grandchildren using
sexually-explicit dolls. It mirrored events during 1984 to 1987 in
the Fells Acres Case, when the Amirault Family was convicted of
bizarre "disclosures," and "fresh-complaint hearsay," with no actual,
credible evidence. The Amiraults and Souzas were tried and convicted
by the same District Attorney, Children's Hospital experts, and judge.
Ray Souza tried stoically to live in the present, always buoying up
Shirley and never dwelling on what had happened to them, as horribly
unjust as it was. Whenever we discussed false memory syndrome, Ray
would assume a look of quiet comprehension, a tacit acknowledgment
that said, "Yeah, I know what happened to us, and it isn't fair, but
can anyone tell me why and how?" He could not understand how these
loved children and grandchildren could say such untrue things about
them.
In 2002, their house arrest ended and the ankle bracelets came
off. But soon roles reversed and Shirley was supporting Ray in his
illness. I felt that Ray still wanted the answer to the why and the
how.of the accusations.
Ray and Shirley enjoyed the companionship of the two sons and three
grandchildren who returned. Sadly, some other members of the extended
Souza family still refuse to accept the sons back. These relatives are
still angry at the harm done to Ray and Shirley.
Looking back through the many articles about the Souzas, only a few
contained quotes from Ray. In an August, 1995 article following their
rejection of their first appeal, he said, when asked by a reporter how
he felt about going to prison, "These things [we were accused of]
never happened. I feel good about myself, no matter which way I go,"
[to prison or to stay at home]. And he went on, "We'll win. We'll win
someday. I don't know when. We're innocent people, and we've suffered
enough and maybe someone will recant. Who knows what will happen? You
just have to look forward."
I like to think that Ray is now in a place where his innocence is
known and proclaimed. When I think of Ray, I think of the 10th verse
of the Sermon on the Mount: "Blessed are they that suffer persecution
for justice's sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven."
We will miss Ray and his quiet strength. We know that FMSF members
join me in sending love and condolences to Shirley and to the rest of
their family.
+----------------------------------------------+
| "Everybody needs his memories. They keep |
| the wolf of insignificance from the door." |
| Saul Bellow |
+----------------------------------------------+
**********************************************************************
* N O T I C E S *
**********************************************************************
* *
* WEB SITES OF INTEREST *
* *
* http://www.theisticsatanism.com/asp/ *
* Against Satanic Panics *
* *
* comp.uark.edu/~lampinen/read.html *
* The Lampinen Lab False Memory Reading Group *
* University of Arkansas *
* *
* www.exploratorium.edu/memory *
* The Exploratorium Memory Exhibit *
* *
* www.tmdArchives.org *
* The Memory Debate Archives *
* *
* www.francefms.com *
* French language website *
* *
* www.psychoheresy-aware.org/ministry.html *
* The Bobgans question Christian counseling *
* *
* www.IllinoisFMS.org *
* Illinois-Wisconsin FMS Society *
* *
* www.ltech.net/OHIOarmhp *
* Ohio Group *
* *
* www.afma.asn.au *
* Australian False Memory Association. *
* *
* www.bfms.org.uk *
* British False Memory Society *
* *
* www.geocities.com/retractor *
* This site is run by Laura Pasley (retractor) *
* *
* www.sirs.com/uptonbooks/index.htm *
* Upton Books *
* *
* www.angelfire.com/tx/recoveredmemories/ *
* Locate books about FMS *
* Recovered Memory Bookstore *
* *
* www.religioustolerance.org/sra.htm *
* Information about Satanic Ritual Abuse *
* *
* www.angryparents.net *
* Parents Against Cruel Therapy *
* *
* www.geocities.com/newcosanz *
* New Zealand FMS Group *
* *
* www.werkgroepwfh.nl *
* Netherlands FMS Group *
* *
* www.falseallegation.org *
* National Child Abuse Defense & Resource Center *
* *
* www.nasw.org/users/markp *
* Excerpts from Victims of Memory. *
* *
* www.rickross.com/groups/fsm.html *
* Ross Institute *
* *
* www.hopkinsmedicine.org/jhhpsychiatry/perspec1.htm *
* Perspectives for Psychiatry by Paul McHugh *
* *
* www.enigma.se/info/FFI.htm *
* FMS in Scandinavia - Janet Hagbom *
* *
* www.ncrj.org *
* National Center for Reason & Justice *
* *
* www.lyingspirits.com *
* Skeptical Information on Theophostic Counseling *
* *
* www.ChildrenInTherapy.org/. *
* Information about Attachment Therapy *
* *
* www.traumaversterking.nl *
* English language web site of Dutch retractor. *
* *
* www.quackwatch.org *
* This site is run by Stephen Barrett, M.D. *
* *
* www.stopbadtherapy.org *
* Contains information about filing complaints *
* *
* www.FMSFonline.org *
* False Memory Syndrome Foundation *
* *
* LEGAL WEBSITES OF INTEREST *
* www.caseassist.com *
* www.findlaw.com *
* www.legalengine.com *
* www.accused.com *
* *
**********************************************************************
* ELIZABETH LOFTUS *
* we www.seweb.uci.edu/faculty/loftus/ *
**********************************************************************
* *
* The Rutherford Family Speaks to FMS Families *
* *
* The video made by the Rutherford family is the most popular video *
* of FMSF families. It covers the complete story from accusation, to *
* retraction and reconciliation. Family members describe the things *
* they did to cope and to help reunite. Of particular interest are *
* Beth Rutherford's comments about what her family did that helped *
* her to retract and return. *
* Available in DVD format only: *
* To order send request to *
* FMSF Video, 1955 Locust St. *
* Philadelphia, PA 19103 *
* $10.00 per DVD; Canada add $4.00; other countries add $10.00 *
* Make checks payable to FMS Foundation *
* *
**********************************************************************
* RECOMMENDED BOOKS *
* *
* REMEMBERING TRAUMA *
* by Richard McNally *
* Harvard University Press *
* *
* SCIENCE and PSEUDOSCIENCE in CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGY *
* S. O. Lilienfeld, S.J. Lynn and J.M. Lohr (eds.) *
* New York: Guilford Press (2003) *
* *
* PSYCHOLOGY ASTRAY: *
* Fallacies in Studies of "Repressed Memory" and Childhood Trauma *
* by Harrison G. Pope, Jr., M.D. *
* Upton Books *
**********************************************************************
* *
* HUNGARY FOR MONSTERS *
* *
* The 2003 film Hungry for Monsters by George Csicsery has been *
* re-released on a new DVD containing 40 minutes of additional *
* scenes exploring the background of recovered memories in the *
* Althaus case. When 15-year-old Nicole Althaus told a teacher that *
* her father was molesting her, the quiet affluent Pittsburgh suburb *
* of Mt. Lebanon, Pennsylvania, was turned inside out. Nicole's *
* father, Rick, was arrested and charged with sexually abusing *
* Nicole amidst bizarre satanic rituals. With the support of her *
* favorite teacher, police, therapists, social workers, and officers *
* of the court, all of whom believed her stories, Nicole began to *
* embellish her initial accusations. As she recovered more memories *
* of wild orgies, sacrificed babies, and murder, more people were *
* arrested, including her mother and a pair of strangers. A year *
* later, all charges were dropped, and Nicole admitted that her *
* accusations were false. After Nicole and her parents reconciled, *
* they sued the authorities. *
* *
* Hungry for Monsters DVD *
* *
* Released by Facets MultiMedia on October 31, 2006. To order copies *
* contact Facets MultiMedia, or rent it on Netflix. *
* *
* www.facets.org/asticat?function=buyitem&catname= *
* facets&catnum=/DV71523 *
* *
* The film has also been acquired by Teachers TV, a UK cable channel *
* for educators. *
* www.teachers.tv/video/4861 *
* *
* For more information about Hungry for Monsters see *
* www.zalafilms.com *
* *
* George Csicsery *
* POB 22833 *
* Oakland CA 94609 USA *
* (510) 428-9284 *
* (510) 428-9273 fax *
* *
**********************************************************************
_____________________________________
F M S B U L L E T I N B O A R D
Contacts & Meetings:
_____________
UNITED STATES
ALABAMA
See Georgia
ALASKA
Kathleen 907-333-5248
ARIZONA
Phoenix
Pat 480-396-9420
ARKANSAS
Little Rock
Al & Lela 870-363-4368
CALIFORNIA
Sacramento
Jocelyn 530-570-1862
San Francisco & North Bay
Charles 415-435-9618 (pm)
San Francisco & South Bay
Eric 408-738-0469
East Bay Area
Judy 925-952-4853
Central Coast
Carole 805-967-8058
Palm Desert
Eileen and Jerry 909-659-9636
Central Orange County - 1st Fri. (MO) @ 7pm
Chris & Alan 949-733-2925
Covina Area
Floyd & Libby 626-357-2750
San Diego Area
Dee 760-439-4630
COLORADO
Colorado Springs
Doris 719-488-9738
CONNECTICUT
S. New England
Earl 203-329-8365 or
Paul 203-458-9173
FLORIDA
Date/Boward
Madeline 954-966-4FMS
Central Florida - Please call for mtg. time
John & Nancy 352-750-5446
Sarasota
Francis & Sally 941-342-8310
Tampa Bay Area
Bob & Janet 727-856-7091
GEORGIA
Atlanta
Wallie & Jill 770-971-8917
ILLINOIS
Chicago & Suburbs - 1st Sun. (MO)
Eileen 847-985-7693 or
Liz & Roger 847-827-1056
Peoria
Bryant & Lynn 309-674-2767
INDIANA
Indiana Assn. for Responsible Mental Health Practices
Pat 260-489-9987
Helen 574-753-2779
KANSAS
Wichita - Meeting as called
Pat 785-762-2825
KENTUCKY
Louisville- Last Sun. (MO) @ 2pm
Bob 502-367-1838
LOUISIANA
Sarah 337-235-7656
MAINE
Rumford
Carolyn 207-364-8891
Portland
Wally & Boby 207-878-9812
MASSACHUSETTS/NEW ENGLAND
Andover - 2nd Sun. (MO) @ 1pm
Frank 978-263-9795
MICHIGAN
Greater Detroit Area
Nancy 248-642-8077
Ann Arbor
Martha 734-439-4055
MINNESOTA
Terry & Collette 507-642-3630
Dan & Joan 651-631-2247
MISSOURI
Kansas City - Meeting as called
Pat 785-738-4840
Springfield - Quarterly, 4th Sat. of
Jan., Apr., Jul., Oct. @12:30pm
Tom 417-753-4878
Roxie 417-781-2058
MONTANA
Lee & Avone 406-443-3189
NEW HAMPSHIRE
Jean 603-772-2269
Mark 802-872-0847
NEW JERSEY
Southern
Sally 609-927-4147
Northern
Nancy 973-729-1433
NEW MEXICO
Albuquerque -2nd Sat. (bi-MO) @1 pm
Southwest Room - Presbyterian Hospital
Maggie 505-662-7521 (after 6:30 pm)
Sy 505-758-0726
NEW YORK
Westchester, Rockland, etc.
Barbara 914-922-1737
Upstate/Albany Area
Elaine 518-399-5749
NORTH CAROLINA
Susan 704-538-7202
OHIO
Cleveland
Bob & Carole 440-356-4544
OKLAHOMA
Oklahoma City
Dee 405-942-0531
Tulsa
Jim 918-582-7363
OREGON
Portland area
Kathy 503-655-1587
PENNSYLVANIA
Harrisburg
Paul & Betty 717-691-7660
Pittsburgh
Rick & Renee 412-563-5509
Montrose
John 717-278-2040
Wayne (includes S. NJ) - 2nd Sat. (MO)
Jim & Jo 610-783-0396
TENNESSEE
Nashville - Wed. (MO) @1pm
Kate 615-665-1160
TEXAS
Houston
Jo or Beverly 713-464-8970
El Paso
Mary Lou 915-595-3945
UTAH
Keith 801-467-0669
VERMONT
Mark 802-872-0847
WASHINGTON
Kathy 503-557-7118
WISCONSIN
Katie & Leo 414-476-0285 or
Susanne & John 608-427-3686
WYOMING
Alan & Lorinda 307-322-4170
_____________
INTERNATIONAL
BRITISH COLUMBIA, CANADA
Vancouver & Mainland
Lloyd 250-741-8941
Victoria & Vancouver Island
John 250-721-3219
MANITOBA
Roma 204-275-5723
ONTARIO, CANADA
London
Adriaan 519-471-6338
Ottawa
Eileen 613-836-3294
Burlington
Ken & Marina 905-637-6030
Waubaushene
Paula 705-543-0318
QUEBEC, CANADA
Chertsey
Mavis 450-882-1480
AUSTRALIA
Evelyn
everei@adam.com.au
BELGIUM
werkgr.fict.herinneringen@altavista.net
ISRAEL
FMS ASSOCIATION fax 972-2-625-9282
NEW ZEALAND
Colleen 09-416-7443
SWEDEN
Ake Moller FAX 48-431-217-90
UNITED KINGDOM
The British False Memory Society
Madeline 44-1225 868-682
____________________________________________
Deadline for the Summer 2007 issue is June 1
Meeting notices MUST be in writing
And should be sent no later than TWO MONTHS PRIOR TO MEETING.
+--------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Do you have access to e-mail? Send a message to |
| pjf@cis.upenn.edu |
| if you wish to receive electronic versions of this newsletter and |
| notices of radio and television broadcasts about FMS. All the |
| message need say is "add to the FMS-News". It would be useful, but |
| not necessary, if you add your full name (all addresses and names |
| will remain strictly confidential). |
+--------------------------------------------------------------------+
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The False Memory Syndrome Foundation is a qualified 501(c)3 corpora-
tion with its principal offices in Philadelphia and governed by its
Board of Directors. While it encourages participation by its members
in its activities, it must be understood that the Foundation has no
affiliates and that no other organization or person is authorized to
speak for the Foundation without the prior written approval of the Ex-
ecutive Director. All membership dues and contributions to the Founda-
tion must be forwarded to the Foundation for its disposition.
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PAMELA FREYD, Ph.D., Executive Director
FMSF Scientific and Professional Advisory Board, March 30, 2007
AARON T. BECK, M.D., D.M.S., U of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA;
TERENCE W. CAMPBELL, Ph.D., Clinical and Forensic Psychology,
Sterling Heights, MI;
ROSALIND CARTWRIGHT, Ph.D., Rush Presbyterian St. Luke's Medical
Center, Chicago, IL;
JEAN CHAPMAN, Ph.D., University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI;
LOREN CHAPMAN, Ph.D., University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI;
FREDERICK C. CREWS, Ph.D., University of California, Berkeley, CA;
ROBYN M. DAWES, Ph.D., Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA;
DAVID F. DINGES, Ph.D., University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA;
HENRY C. ELLIS, Ph.D., University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM;
FRED H. FRANKEL, MBChB, DPM, Harvard University Medical School;
GEORGE K. GANAWAY, M.D., Emory University of Medicine, Atlanta, GA;
MARTIN GARDNER, Author, Hendersonville, NC;
ROCHEL GELMAN, Ph.D., Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ;
HENRY GLEITMAN, Ph.D., University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA;
LILA GLEITMAN, Ph.D., University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA;
RICHARD GREEN, M.D., J.D., Charing Cross Hospital, London;
DAVID A. HALPERIN, M.D., (deceased) Mount Sinai School of Medicine,
New York, NY;
ERNEST HILGARD, Ph.D., (deceased) Stanford University, Palo Alto, CA;
JOHN HOCHMAN, M.D., UCLA Medical School, Los Angeles, CA;
DAVID S. HOLMES, Ph.D., University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS;
PHILIP S. HOLZMAN, Ph.D., (deceased) Harvard University,
Cambridge, MA;
ROBERT A. KARLIN, Ph.D. , Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ;
HAROLD LIEF, M.D., (deceased) University of Pennsylvania,
Philadelphia, PA;
ELIZABETH LOFTUS, Ph.D., University of California, Irvine, CA;
SUSAN L. McELROY, M.D., University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH;
PAUL McHUGH, M.D., Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD;
HAROLD MERSKEY, D.M., University of Western Ontario, London, Canada;
SPENCER HARRIS MORFIT, Author, Westford, MA;
ULRIC NEISSER, Ph.D., Cornell University, Ithaca, NY;
RICHARD OFSHE, Ph.D., University of California, Berkeley, CA;
EMILY CAROTA ORNE, B.A., University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA;
MARTIN ORNE, M.D., Ph.D., (deceased) U of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia
LOREN PANKRATZ, Ph.D., Oregon Health Sciences Univ., Portland, OR;
CAMPBELL PERRY, Ph.D., (deceased) Concordia University,
Montreal, Canada;
MICHAEL A. PERSINGER, Ph.D., Laurentian University, Ontario, Canada;
AUGUST T. PIPER, Jr., M.D., Seattle, WA;
HARRISON POPE, Jr., M.D., Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA;
JAMES RANDI, Author and Magician, Plantation, FL;
HENRY L. ROEDIGER, III, Ph.D. ,Washington University, St. Louis, MO;
CAROLYN SAARI, Ph.D., Loyola University, Chicago, IL;
THEODORE SARBIN, Ph.D., (deceased) University of California,
Santa Cruz, CA;
THOMAS A. SEBEOK, Ph.D., (deceased) U of Indiana, Bloomington, IN;
MICHAEL A. SIMPSON, M.R.C.S., L.R.C.P., M.R.C, D.O.M., Center for
Psychosocial & Traumatic Stress, Pretoria, South Africa;
MARGARET SINGER, Ph.D., {deceased) University of California,
Berkeley, CA;
RALPH SLOVENKO, J.D., Ph.D., Wayne State University Law School,
Detroit, MI;
DONALD SPENCE, Ph.D., Robert Wood Johnson Medical Ctr, Piscataway, NJ;
JEFFREY VICTOR, Ph.D., Jamestown Community College, Jamestown, NY;
HOLLIDA WAKEFIELD, M.A., Institute of Psychological Therapies,
Northfield, MN;
CHARLES A. WEAVER, III, Ph.D. Baylor University, Waco, TX
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