Repressed Memory Therapy Creates Victims (From America's Victims: Opposing Viewpoints, P 109-115, 1996, David Bender, Bruno Leone, et al, eds. -- See NCJ-165502)

• NCJ Number: 165513
• Author(s): F Crews
• Date Published: 1996
• Length: 7 pages
• Sale Source: Greenhaven Press
• Publication Type: Survey
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America
• Note: Opposing Viewpoints Series

Annotation

Some psychotherapists and popular authors contend that memories of traumatic events, such as chronic sexual abuse, can be repressed for decades and then later be vividly recalled by victims in therapy, but the author asserts that repressed memory therapy has no scientific basis.

Abstract

False memories can be planted in patients by overzealous therapists. In particular, repressed memory therapy can have a detrimental effect on women who are tricked into believing false memories. From the standpoint of public health, the reliance on repressed memory therapy is disturbing because it increases the number of "false positives," women who were never molested but who are enticed into believing they were. In the eyes of recovery movement leaders, as many as half of all women are sexual abuse victims. The recovery movement's erroneous assumptions and feminist affinity do not serve the best interests of women and instead tend to revictimize women.