Psychology Faculty Research

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Browsing Psychology Faculty Research by Author "DePrince, Anne P."

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    Dissociative tendencies, attention, and memory
    (Blackwell, 1999) DePrince, Anne P.; Freyd, Jennifer J.
    Two groups of college students were selected on the basis of their scores on the Dissociative Experiences Scale (DES). The high-DES group and low-DES group both completed the standard and a new dual-task version of the Stroop ink-naming task with xs (baseline condition) and color, neutral, and emotionally charged words. Free recall results indicated that high-DES participants remembered fewer emotionally charged words than low-DES participants. We found a crossover interaction for Stroop interference: High-DES participants showed more interference (conflicting color--baseline latency for ink naming) in a selective-attention Stroop task and less interference in the dual-task Stroop task. The interaction between attentional context and dissociation for Stroop interference and the free recall results are consistent with a cognitive-environments view of dissociative tendencies. In this view, dissociative tendencies, which have been otherwise speculated to be largely deleterious, can be advantageous in certain contexts.
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    Forgetting traumatic stimuli
    (2004-02-20T23:21:48Z) DePrince, Anne P.; Freyd, Jennifer J.
    Previous work reported in this journal (DePrince & Freyd, 1999) suggested that the cognitive capacities of high dissociators are impaired under conditions of focused (selective) attention, but not under conditions of divided attention, compared to low dissociators. Using a directed forgetting paradigm, the current study demonstrates that under divided-attention demands high dissociators have impaired memory for words associated with trauma (e.g. "incest") but not neutral words, as compared with low dissociators. In addition, the high dissociators report significantly more trauma history and significantly more "betrayal trauma" (abuse by a caregiver). These results are consistent with the proposal that dissociation may aid individuals with a history of betrayal traumas to keep threatening information out of awareness.
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    Memory and Dissociative Tendencies: The Roles of Attentional Context and Word Meaning in a Di rected Forgetting Task
    (Journal of Trauma & Dissociation, 2001) DePrince, Anne P.; Freyd, Jennifer J.
    Conceptual and methodological approaches from cog nitive science have increasingly been applied to research examining the relation between trauma, dissociation and basic cognitive functioning. The current study replicates and extends recent research that examined performance in a directed forgetting task using PTSD and trauma history as the grouping variables (McNally, Metzger, Lasko, Clancy, & Pitman, 1998) to college students who were classified as high or low dissociators based on their performance on the Dissociative Experiences Scale (DES: Bernstein & Putnam, 1986). High and low DES participants’ performance was examined under two attentional contexts: a selective attention condition and two new divided attention conditions (based on DePrince & Freyd, 1999). Differences between the groups were revealed when a divided attention version of the task was employed. Consistent with DePrince and Freyd (1999), when divided attention was required, high DES participants recalled fewer trauma and more neutral words than did low DES participants, who showed the opposite pattern.
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    Self-Reported Memory for Abuse Depends Upon Victim-Perpetrator Relationship
    (The Haworth Press, Inc., 2001) Freyd, Jennifer J.; DePrince, Anne P.; Zurbriggen, Eileen L.
    We present preliminary results from the Betrayal Trauma Inventory (BTI) testing predictions from betrayal trauma theory (Freyd, 1994, 1996, in press) about the relationship between amnesia and betrayal by a caregiver. The BTI assesses trauma history using behaviorally defined events in the domains of sexual, physical, and emotional childhood abuse, as well as other lifetime traumatic events. When participants endorse an abuse experience, follow-up questions assess a variety of factors including memory impairment and perpetrator relationship. Preliminary results support our prediction that abuse perpetrated by a caregiver is related to less persistent memories of abuse. This relationship is significant for sexual and physical abuse. Regression analyses revealed that age was not a significant predictor of memory impairment and that duration of abuse could not account for the findings.