Dissociation : Vol. 8, No. 4, p. 253-258 : The confirmation and disconfirmation of memories of abuse in DID patients: A naturalistic clinical study

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Date

1995-12

Authors

Kluft, Richard P., 1943-

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Publisher

Ridgeview Institute and the International Society for the Study of Dissociation

Abstract

The charts of 34 dissociative identity disorder (DID) patients in treatment with the author were reviewed for instances of the confirmation or disconfirmation of recalled episodes of abuse occurring naturalistically in the course of their psychotherapies. Nineteen, or 56%, had instances of the confirmation of recalled abuses. Ten of the 19, or 53%, had always recalled the abuses that were confirmed. However, 13 of the 19, or 68%, obtained documentation of events that were recovered in the course of therapy, usually with the use of hypnosis. Three patients, or 9%, had instances in which the inaccuracy of their recollection could be demonstrated. The forgetting of traumatic experiences, their reasonably accurate recovery in treatment, and the formation of pseudomemories in clinical populations were all documented in this study. This suggests that stances that are either extremely credulous of retrieved recollections or extremely skeptical of retrieved recollections are inconsistent with clinical data, and therefore are not constructive influences on the contemporary scientific study of trauma and memory.

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p. 253-258

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