What can subjective forgetting tell us about memory for childhood trauma?

Ghetti, Simona; Edelstein, Robin S.; Goodman, Gail S.; Cordòn, Ingrid M.; Quas, Jodi A.; Alexander, Kristen Weede; Redlich, Allison D.; Jones, David P.H.

doi:10.3758/bf03193248

Cited by 41 publications

(28 citation statements)

References 80 publications

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“…Women who report forgetting childhood sexual or physical abuse (Chu, Frey, Ganzel, & Matthews, 1999;Geraerts, Merckelbach, Jelicic, Smeets, & van Heerden, 2006;Geraerts, Smeets, Jelicic, van Heerden, & Merckelbach, 2005;Ghetti et al, 2006;but see McNally et al, 2000) and other traumas (e.g., witnessing abuse; Chu et al, 1999) have higher dissociation scores compared to others.…”

Section: Dissociation and Temporary Forgettingmentioning

confidence: 96%

“…From 15% to 64% of victims report experiencing temporary forgetting of childhood sexual abuse experiences (e.g., Briere & Conte, 1993;Elliot & Briere, 1995;Epstein & Bottoms, 1998;Ghetti et al, 2006). Epstein and Bottoms (2002) found no differences in the prevalence of forgetting for childhood sexual and physical abuse, although victims of other types of childhood trauma (e.g., severe accidents) reported significantly less forgetting than victims of sexual abuse (see also Greenhoot, McCloskey, & Glisky, 2005;Melchert, 1999;Melchert & Parker, 1997).…”

mentioning

confidence: 92%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Trauma Severity and Defensive Emotion-Regulation Reactions as Predictors of Forgetting Childhood Trauma

Bottoms¹,

Najdowski²,

Epstein³

et al. 2012

Journal of Trauma & Dissociation

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Using a retrospective survey, we studied a sample of 1,679 college women to determine whether reports of prior forgetting of childhood sexual abuse, physical abuse, and other traumas could be explained by trauma severity and individual differences in the use of defensive emotion-regulation reactions (i.e., repressive coping, dissociation, and fantasy proneness). Among victims of physical abuse (but not sexual abuse or other types of trauma), those who experienced severe abuse and used defensive reactions were sometimes more likely to report temporary forgetting of abuse but other times less likely to report forgetting. We also found unanticipated main effects of trauma severity on temporary forgetting. Our results provide an understanding of victims' experiences of forgetting by demonstrating the importance of considering unique effects of trauma type, different aspects of trauma severity, and victims' defensive reactions to trauma.

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Section: Dissociation and Temporary Forgettingmentioning

confidence: 96%

mentioning

confidence: 92%

Trauma Severity and Defensive Emotion-Regulation Reactions as Predictors of Forgetting Childhood Trauma

Bottoms¹,

Najdowski²,

Epstein³

et al. 2012

Journal of Trauma & Dissociation

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“…For example, although Christianson and Hübinette (1993) found no relationship between rated degree of emotion and the number of details witnesses to a bank robbery remembered, Woolnough and MacLeod (2001) found that victims of violent events reported more details than bystanders of the same event. Likewise, in samples of adults who had been victims of child sexual abuse, Ghetti et al (2006) found that increases in severity of abuse were associated with forgetting, whereas Alexander et al (2005) found that posttraumatic stress disorder was positively associated with memory accuracy. Consistent with these findings, Yuille and Daylen's review (1998) illustrated that the impact of stress on eyewitness performance can vary all the way from improving memory to causing considerable disruption in memory.…”

Section: Stressmentioning

confidence: 95%

“…Although most laboratory witness researchers have not attempted to test the generalizability of their findings with eyewitnesses, some researchers have examined eyewitness performance (e.g., Alexander et al, 2005;Behrman & Davey, 2001;Christianson & Hübinette, 1993;Cooper et al, 2002;Cutshall & Yuille, 1989;Fahsing, Ask, & Granhag, 2004;Ghetti et al, 2006Ghetti et al, , 2002Kuehn, 1974;Mechanic, Resick, & Griffin, 1998;Porter & Woodworth, 2007;Quas et al, 2005;Valentine, Pickering, & Darling, 2003;Wagstaff et al, 2003;Woolnough & MacLeod, 2001;Yuille & Cutshall, 1986). Researchers have also explored the memory of eyewitnesses to disasters (e.g., Parker, Bahrick, Fivush, & Johnson, 2006;Thompson, Morton, & Fraser, 1997); battles (e.g., Geraerts et al, 2007;Southwick, Morgan, Nicolaou, & Charney, 1997); police or military simulation studies (e.g., Beehr et al, 2004;Hulse & Memon, 2006;Morgan et al, 2004); and experiences in concentration camps (e.g., Wagenaar & Groeneweg, 1990;Wessel, Merckelbach, & Dekkers, 2002), among other stressful events (e.g., Peace & Porter, 2004).…”

Section: Are Laboratory Witnesses and Eyewitnesses The Same?mentioning

confidence: 98%

Expert Testimony on Laboratory Witnesses

Yuille

Ternes

Cooper

2010

Journal of Forensic Psychology Practice

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Based on the past three decades of diverse and extensive research on eyewitness memory issues, the courts are increasingly being asked to accept psychologists as experts on eyewitness performance. This article examines a sample of this body of research and questions its helpfulness to triers of fact. The majority of eyewitness research has been conducted in the laboratory rather than in the field, thereby examining laboratory witnesses, not actual eyewitnesses. Although there is some consensus among some eyewitness experts that certain factors related to laboratory witness performance are robust enough to be discussed in court or applied to the criminal justice system, we suggest that much more research needs to be conducted to assess the generalizability of laboratory witness research to most realms of the eyewitness context. As some research demonstrates that actual eyewitnesses behave differently than laboratory eyewitnesses, we suggest that psychologists who are required to consider eyewitness issues in the criminal justice system make an effort to differentiate between the findings of laboratory studies and the findings of field studies.

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“…Ein Teil der Befragten gab jeweils das Indexdelikt zwar aktuell an, erklärte aber, es zwischenzeitlich nicht erinnert haben zu können (16 % der befragten 75 Frauen bei Williams [71]; 15 % der 138 Befragten bei Goodman et al [25]; für spezifische Analysen zu dieser Subgruppe s. Ghetti et al, [23]). Zeitweiliges Vergessen wurde in beiden studien häufiger von Befragten mit schwereren Delikten angegeben.…”

Section: Angaben Zur Amnesie Von Traumatischen Erlebnissenunclassified

Reports of traumatic experiences

Volbert¹

2011

Forens Psychiatr Psychol Kriminol

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Ü b e r s i c h tZusammenfassung es gibt eine anhaltende Kontroverse darüber, ob sich erinnerungen an traumatische ereignisse qualitativ von anderen erinnerungsprozessen unterscheiden. Zur Frage etwaiger Spezifika von Traumaerinnerungen werden ergebnisse empirischer studien ausgewertet, wobei sowohl Vergleiche von erinnerungen an traumatische ereignisse mit erinnerungen an andere bedeutsame ereignisse als auch Vergleiche von Patienten mit Posttraumatischen belastungsstörungen (Ptbs-) mit Non-Ptbs-Gruppen an traumatische Erlebnisse berücksichtigt werden. Während PTBS-Patienten häufiger über intrusive Erinnerungen berichten als Non-Ptbs-Gruppen, ist eine besondere erinnerungsfragmentierung weder bei erinnerungen an traumatische ereignisse im Allgemeinen noch bei traumatischen Erinnerungen von PTBS-Patienten konsistent nachgewiesen worden. Implikationen für die aussagepsychologische begutachtung werden erörtert.Schlüsselwörter trauma · erinnerung · Glaubhaftigkeitsbegutachtung · Posttraumatische belastungsstörung · Zeuge Reports of traumatic experiencesspecial memories? special assessment?Abstract the manner in which traumatic events are processed and recalled remains highly controversial. A central issue in the debate is whether traumatic experiences affect memory differently than other events. In this paper, two lines of research are reviewed: (a) comparisons of characteristics of traumatic and other memories and (b) comparisons of characteristics of traumatic memories of trauma survivors with and without posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). While PTSD groups reported more intrusive memories than non-PtsD groups, there is no consistent evidence for memory fragmentation neither for traumatic events in general nor for PtsD patients. implications for credibility assessments are discussed.

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What can subjective forgetting tell us about memory for childhood trauma?

Cited by 41 publications

References 80 publications

Trauma Severity and Defensive Emotion-Regulation Reactions as Predictors of Forgetting Childhood Trauma

Trauma Severity and Defensive Emotion-Regulation Reactions as Predictors of Forgetting Childhood Trauma

Expert Testimony on Laboratory Witnesses

Reports of traumatic experiences

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