122739
Description
Mind Map by Stephanie Price, updated more than 1 year ago
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Created by Stephanie Price
almost 12 years ago
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Forgetting Explanation: Motivated Forgetting - Repression.
- Repression is sometimes referred
to as motivated forgetting,
meaning that we forget things
because we wish to forget them.
- According to psychodynamic theory, we have
a set of unconscious defence mechanisms to
protect our conscious self from unpleasant
thoughts and events. Repression is a defence
mechanism whereby unpleasant or upsetting
memories are pushed into the unconscious,
so that the conscious self is not upset by them.
- According to psychodynamic theory, these
unpleasant memories can stay in the
unconscious for many years, perhaps for
ever. However, although we may not be
consciously aware of them, our conscious
behaviour may be affect by their presence.
- E.g. Someone who has
repressed a childhood memory
of a horrific accident may suffer
from an unexplained anxiety
disorder as an adult.
- Research Study:
Levinger and Clark
(1961).
- Research Study:
Levinger and Clark
(1961).
- E.g. Someone who has
repressed a childhood memory
of a horrific accident may suffer
from an unexplained anxiety
disorder as an adult.
- According to psychodynamic theory, these
unpleasant memories can stay in the
unconscious for many years, perhaps for
ever. However, although we may not be
consciously aware of them, our conscious
behaviour may be affect by their presence.
- According to psychodynamic theory, we have
a set of unconscious defence mechanisms to
protect our conscious self from unpleasant
thoughts and events. Repression is a defence
mechanism whereby unpleasant or upsetting
memories are pushed into the unconscious,
so that the conscious self is not upset by them.
- Psychiatrists refer to a condition known as
dissociative amnesia, which takes several forms, but
usually involves a failure to recall specific unpleasant
or traumatic events. In very severe cases, sufferers
even forget who they are or where they come from,
sometimes even taking on a new identity altogether.
- Evaluation.
- The general problem with
psychodynamic theory is that it
cannot be tested easily. Defence
mechanisms are unconscious
processes, so do not lend
themselves to investigation.
- Word-association studies, like that of
Levinger and Clark (1961), are not a very
realistic test of repression, because memory
for real-life unpleasant events is presumably
much more emotionally disturbing than
memory for lists of unpleasant words.
- In the Williams study (1994) there may have been
other explanations for the failure to recall the
incidents of abuse. Former victims of abuse give
various reasons for choosing not to talk about
events they can clearly recall. E.g. They might wish
to forget the past and get on with the future; they
might be embarrassed; they might wish to protect
their parents; or they simply prefer not to disclose
such events to the interviewer (Femina et al. 1990).
- Findings in single cases of
dissociative amnesia should
not be generalised to explain
other cases of forgetting.
- Our own experience tells us
that many people do recall
unpleasant memories very
clearly indeed, so the
question arises, why would
we repress some unpleasant
memories and not others?
- There is evidence that people who
have suffered upsetting experiences
are more likely to be affected by
anxiety disorders, although, in itself,
this finding does not directly support
the theory of repression.
- The general problem with
psychodynamic theory is that it
cannot be tested easily. Defence
mechanisms are unconscious
processes, so do not lend
themselves to investigation.
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