The Myth of Repressed Memory: False Memories and Allegations of Sexual Abuse

While acknowledging the reality of childhood sexual abuse, Loftus, a research psychologist specializing in memory, believes that in many cases, people create false memories of nonexistent abuse, prompted to do so by their psychotherapists. Writing in the first person with coauthor Ketcham (with whom she wrote Witness for the Defense), Loftus critiques the tools used by some therapists (``trance work,'' hypnosis, dream analysis, journal writing, etc.) to ``recover'' patients' buried memories. She presents numerous case histories involving presumed memories that turned out to be fabrications and reports on a study in which false memories of childhood events were created in men and women volunteers. She also discusses her involvement in the case of Paul Ingram, a Washington deputy sheriff who confessed that he was a priest in a satanic cult and sodomizer of children after his two daughters accused him of sexual abuse; he later retracted his confession but was imprisoned anyway. This eye-opening book makes a compelling argument for caution. Author tour. (Sept.)