1 / 6

TRAUMATIC AMNESIAS: psychogenic forgetting?

TRAUMATIC AMNESIAS: psychogenic forgetting?. Global retrograde amnesias and fugues Sudden loss of autobiographical memory and identity May be triggered by severe psychological stress Some evidence for link to earlier physical trauma or disease Pattern of recovery is diverse

latona
Download Presentation

TRAUMATIC AMNESIAS: psychogenic forgetting?

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. TRAUMATIC AMNESIAS: psychogenic forgetting? • Global retrograde amnesias and fugues • Sudden loss of autobiographical memory and identity • May be triggered by severe psychological stress • Some evidence for link to earlier physical trauma or disease • Pattern of recovery is diverse • Sudden, quick and complete • Gradual and incomplete • Failure of recovery • Rarer than the media suggest • < 1% of clinical casework in some estimates Renee Zellweger AsNurse Betty Richard Gere and Ed Norton in Primal Fear

  2. "A fugue is a combination of amnesia and physical fright. The individual flees from his customary surroundings toward the assumptions of a new identity.“ American Psychiatric Association 1994 Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition

  3. Recovery from Fugue states: a sampler • Libby Morris: lost from a shopping mall • Rapid, almost complete recovery • Amnesia for fugue period • Ricky Stephenson: AWOL • Unresolved after two years • Relearning his past • Jody Roberts: You’re a thousand miles away • Unresolved after 12 years • New, stable identity established • James Smith: Rip vanWinkle awakes • Fugue ends after 25 years • “gap” before recovery • Amnesia for fugue period

  4. Dissociative Identity Disorder (aka Multiple Personality Disorder): A capsule history • Rash of cases in late 19th century • Seen as symptom of “hysteria” • Extremely rare until 1980’s • Pre 1970’s < 100; ’85 – ’89, c. 40,000 • Media and professional attention • DID and the recovered memory movement • Often linked to recovered memories of abuse, other more bizarre experiences • Often evolves during aggressive therapy • 1990’s: backlash of skepticismRecanters in court

  5. CHARACTERISTICS OF DID • The person • Associated with early, chronic abuse or trauma (est. 50-70% sexual or physical abuse incidence) • And with “a trail of psychopathology” • Tend to be highly hypnotizable • Memory aspects • Autobiographical dissociation may be complete, or “leaky” • Some evidence for implicit memory “across identities” • The outlook • May resolve with therapy or time • Difficult to separate “genuine” cases from role-playing • Relation to everyday “dissociations” in mood and memory • Relation to fugues?

  6. DID: an fMRI study(Tsai, et al. 1999) • 47-yr old woman • Severe childhood abuse • DID and PTSD diagnosis; long-term therapy • Hippocampal volume reduced 1.1 cm3 vs. 2.6 +/-.02 cm3 • Normal-range score (106) on WMS • Cued switch to/from: • Alter personality (“Guardian” 8 yr old) • Irrelevant personality (“Player” 8 yr old) • Avg. 30 seconds to switch • fMRI during switch, maintenance • Right hippocampus: • Inhibition during switch to alter • Activation during switch from alter • No changes during “control” switches

More Related