Hypnosis & Memory Question

Factual Questions
1

I’ve read that hypnosis is sometimes used to recover repressed memories. The idea is that you have a memory of a traumatic event that you have blocked out that can be retrieved under hypnosis. Setting aside whether repressed memories are real or not, it brings up an interesting question.

Ever since I was a kid I’ve had a poor memory for events in my life. My brother, and my 89 year old father, can both remember vivid details of their childhood while I remember almost nothing, and I don’t even have a clear recollection of my life only 10 years ago. Unless I have a strong reason to have to remember something it gets filed away and becomes irretrievable after only a few years.

I figure that memory, like many things, falls on a standard curve with some people at the high end (Eidetic or Photographic memory), some people at the low end (total Amnesia), and most people somewhere in the middle. I feel like I am at the low end of normal. My short term memory is okay, but my long term memory not so much.

If hypnosis has the potential of retrieving repressed memories, how good is it at retrieving memories that aren’t repressed? In other words, if I wanted to remember something that happened to me during my birthday party when I turned 2, almost 60 years ago, could hypnosis be used to help me remember what happened on that particular day? I don’t want my brain to imagine what might have happened, I want the actual memory to be recovered. I assume there are memories in there, but for some reason I just can’t seem to get at them.

My guess is that if the memory was there I should be able to pull at least something out so hypnosis isn’t going to really help me that much, but having never been hypnotized I have no idea what is or isn’t possible.

2

I don’t know if there’s been any scientific study of this. The concern would be that any recollections whether prompted or not by a hypnotist would still be fabrications of your mind. Most people seem to lose detail in their memories over time but often have no problem unknowingly manufacturing new details. One of the problems in testing the technique would be confirming the events of long time past. Unless you have video taken of the past events you’d be relying on someone else’s recollection of the events to determine if your recalled memories were accurate.

I’ll also point that there has been research into eidetic or photographic memory and no one can demonstrate that kind of ability. Some people are much better at remembering detail than others but no one has shown the ability to have ‘photographic’ recall.

3

Repressed memories are pretty bogus. At TriPolar noted, they are often fabrications suggested by the hypnotist or others.

Your brain has only so much storage space so I doubt that much of one’s life memories could be stored.

4

About 25 or 30 years ago, I read about a study in which two groups of people were shown a short film of a street scene. Some time later, one by one, they were asked a series of questions about the film (e.g., What color was the third car that drove by? How many people were standing on the corner? etc.) The people in the first group were simply asked the questions; the members of the second group were placed under hypnosis for the questioning.

The results: both groups scored about equally. The difference was that the people under hypnosis were less likely to answer “I don’t know.” They would invent incorrect answers rather than give no answer at all.

I can’t supply a cite for this, and if anyone else remembers reading about this study, I’d appreciate it if they’d supply me with one. I used to be an avid reader of Martin Gardner, James Randi, and the Skeptical Inquirer, so one of them is most likely the source.

5

LMGTFY, or try anyway. I quickly found several articles mentioning studies that vaguely resemble your description, e.g.:

What Hypnosis Really Does to Your Brain

Or maybe this:

The truth about hypnosis and memory

6

Susan Clancy, who studies false memory and wrote a book after studying alien abduction “victims,” has this to say about hypnosis (cite):

[Quote=Susan Clancy]
Hypnosis, she says, “is a bad way to refresh your memories. Not only that, it renders you susceptible to creating memories of things that never happened, things that were suggested to you or that you just imagined. If you (or your therapist) have pre-existing beliefs or expectations, you’re liable to recall experiences that fit with these beliefs, rather than events that actually happened.”
[/Quote]

7

Thanks. I’ve tried Googling for it, but found nothing. The studies you found sound similar to what I remember, but I don’t think it was either one.

Maybe I should submit to hypnosis to remember where I read it… :dubious:

8

I suggest you look at the work of Elizabeth Loftus. Her academic career has been based on memory and false memories and will probably directly answer your questions.

J.

9

Hypnosis not only causes you to make up the gaps (whether from your own memory or suggestions from the hypnotist or both), but also makes you more sure that the confabulations are accurate.

Actual repression of memories to the point that you can’t recall it at all is really uncommon.

I also want to point out that confabulation is just how our memory works. You are constantly reforming your own memories. Hypnosis though shuts down inhibitions, including those that allow you to (sometimes) notice confabulation.

10

I don’t think there’s such a thing as “storage space” in the brain.

Besides, this question intrigues me a lot because of an anecdotal event that I mentioned here many times.

Years ago (maybe I was 40, I couldn’t tell anymore), my mom showed me old pictures, some of them of me as a small kid. On one of them (age 4, I guess), I was holding a rubber daffy duck in my arms. Upon seeing this picture, not only I remembered this toy I had completely forgotten about, but I felt the texture and taste of the duck’s beack in my mouth (presumably I was munching on the beak sometimes).

So, my brain was “storing” somewhere very specific memories (the toy itself, what I was doing with it, but also its feels and taste) I just had no access to, and could instantly find them on the “shelves” when provided with the proper trigger (note that I don’t remember anymore these things, like the taste, for instance. It’s now only the memory of a memory).
This event deeply intrigued me. I wondered what else could be “stored” so precisely. How much was “stored”. Is it some rare thing (e.g. : I remembered these thing because, say, I loved the toy, and/or something very important happened while I was munching on the beak, so it went to the “memory shelves”), or something relatively common (I would remember how I felt about some bike ride when I was 11 if I was presented with a picture of it), or absurdly general (the exact number of opened leaves on a tree I passed by on march 13 2002 is “stored” somewhere, I just have no trigger available to retrieve this data).

More generally, I’m intrigued by how differently memory work depending on people. For instance, a romantic interest of mine has an extremely good memory in general. She can “conjure up” very precise memories of significant events, including words pronounced, feelings, smells, body attitude, etc… For my part, not only my memory isn’t as good, but it works very differently. It’s more like a recreated story with “pictures” that I know aren’t the “real thing” but a recreation in images of the event.

For instance, let’s assume we had a particularly romantic meeting. She will remember my facial expression, my clothes, my words exactly. For my part, I will just “know” what happened, and a mental image will pop up in my mind, which fits my thoughts and feeling but where her expression, her clothes, etc…are attributed arbitrarily (and unconsciously, the image just pops up, as I said) by my creative brain. For example, in this “memory” she will wear clothes that she doesn’t even own. I often envy her ability, because she can to some extent “relive” her memories, while I can only “retell” them to myself.

Even more generally regarding how the brain works, an older thread also intrigued me. It appeared in this thread that images take a big place in the mental activity of some people, and none at all for some others. For instance, if you mention a red car to me, the image of a red car will pop up in my mind. If you mention your mother, the image of an old lady will appear. Maybe not at all fitting the description you’re giving, but there will be a mental image. While several people mentioned that they never have such mental images unless they consciously create them. They thoughts (or memories) are “in words”, like a book, while mine are “in images” like a movie.
Sorry for the long post, but it’s something I find fascinating.

TL;DR :

1)Some memories are “stored” in the brain and can be suddenly be retrieved with the proper trigger. How much really are? How much could we remember that we don’t if we could magically find the proper triggers?

2)Memory works so differently depending on the people that we almost could belong to different species. What you’re thinking about when you’re mentioning memories can be totally different from what I think about.

3)It’s utterly mystifying and fascinating.

11

No offense, but how do you know your memory of the taste and texture was accurate?

A theory is only worthwhile if it allows one to make accurate predictions. If showing you a picture of the duck allows you to suddenly recall some verifiable detail, then the theory of recovered memory is supported. Otherwise it is more like doing cold reading on yourself.

IYSWIM.

Regards,
Shodan

12

Memories fade unless they are reinforced. I’m not trying to say that some people don’t have better memories than others. But if a person is in the habit of retreaving memories, they will be more likely to remember those things that they habitually recollect.

The down side of recollection is that memories are stored in many different places in the brain, and each area tags the memory in a different way. Recalling the memory reinforces it, but it also retags it according to the way that the brain is interpreting events today. So memories that have been repeatedly recollected become more edited than memories that have been less often recollected.

Others have mentioned that associations can cause memories to pop. Physical objects and smells can trigger memories. So can songs that you haven’t heard in a long time. If you’re trying to remember a birthday, pictures could help. Do you know where you would have been living? If so, driving by on Google Earth might also trigger something.

Memories get tagged with associations. Toys, clothes, relatives, cartoons - anything that takes you back to that time might pop something loose.

You might be able to triangulate on memories from a certain time. But a lot of memories never make it from short term to long term memory. And long term memories do fade. Just out of curiosity, have you ever been back to your old elementary school as an adult?

Everything is stored in multiple areas, with multiple tags, including mood. You are more likely to remember a happy event when you’re happy and a sad event when you’re sad. Fear has it’s own memory system and memories associated with fear don’t fade as easily as other memories.

Have you ever walked into a room and forgotten why you went there? Going back to the room where you formed the intention will usually let you remember what you wanted. Association with location.

All memories are recreated from pieces during recall. Some people’s minds create a more complete subjective experience, but that will be, at least partially, their minds filling in the gaps. (Sort of like the frog DNA in Jurassic Park.) A strong memory isn’t necessarily a more accurate one.

And, yes, memory is fascinating.

13

I saw a program on TV a few years back, I think it was a Nova or a National Geographic, that talked about brain functions including memory. One takeaway I remember from that show was that everything you see, hear, feel (perceive) is stored in memory at the time, at least temporarily, and that if it’s important enough, or accessed often enough, it gets stored permanently. If it’s inconsequential, like driving around with your mother when you’re 2 and nothing important happens, it’s not stored permanently. In fact when you sleep your brain is cleaning out old memories you don’t ‘need’ or care about anymore.

So I think my 2nd birthday would have been a significant even in my young life, as opposed to just an average day, so you would think it would have been stored permanently, but I have no way to retrieve it. It might still be in my memory somewhere, but I just can’t get to it, or it may be gone forever.

I was wondering if hypnosis can retrieve memories that you just can’t get to but are still there. The answer seems to be that it’s probably gone, and even if it was still there hypnosis wouldn’t be a particularly reliable way to retrieve it… thanks everyone!

14

Hypnosis is an altered state of consciousness. I’d be worried that it’s enough like sleep that you might be dreaming, and create things that way. All hypnosis really is, is a very, very relaxed state, where you are still conscious, but just barely. Stage hypnosis is an act where the people being hypnotized are complicit.

I have a good memory (or at least I did when I was in my 20s), and I know this, because I once volunteered for an experiment (when I was taking a psychology class, and required to volunteer for a certain number of them, run by grad students) on memory, and it had to do with using techniques to enhance memory, so they wanted people whose memory was typical-- not impaired, and no so good, that they wouldn’t show improvement with the techniques. So before you could participate in the actual experiment, you had to pass the bell curve test, and I “failed,” in that my recall was too good.

I knew I had a pretty good memory, because in plays in high school, I was always the first one off book, and I knew I could find books in the library again that I’d checked out years before, by remembering where they’d been in a university library with 10 floors of stacks. Sometimes I remembered the call number, other times I just remembered the location. I made it through 4 years of college with a 3.2 GPA without taking notes (would have been higher, but, stupid math). I didn’t know I was way on one end of the bell curve, though.

So let me tell you that we just don’t remember everything. I don’t think we could live if we did. I have enough earworms, and passages from movies, old conversations, etc., keeping me awake at night. It’s impossible that everything that ever happened to me is locked away in my head some place. Most of what happens to us, we just don’t remember. Usually, we’re not paying close enough attention. It would be exhausting if we were. Other times, there’s no need to remember things, so why spend the energy on it?

15

Of course, I don’t know if this memory was accurate/real.

But contrarily to you, I believe it’s much more likely that the memory was real. If anything because we all (I assume) have the experience of remembering long forgotten things, for instance when someone mention them. Things that you never thought about during the last three decades or so, for instance. So the question is rather whether the brain can accurately store specific details (feel and taste of the beak).

Also, it wouldn’t be a cold reading, anyway, rather something akin to a brain fart. My brain would have needed to fabricate on the spot a fake memory on the basis of the picture (the idea that I would suck/munch on the beak. There was no reason to assume that from the picture). And then create also on the spot a feeling and taste. It’s not impossible, it happens all the time when we dream. So, it would be something more similar to an hallucination. It’s conceivable, but it seems to me an hypothesis weirder than the assumption that it was a real memory. YMMV.

16

We know that our brains ‘fill in the gaps’ all the time. We probably couldn’t function without that facility.

We also ignore vast amounts of information. Imagine driving along an urban road and actually seeing and interpreting everything around us - Our brains would explode.

In between making stuff up and ignoring loads of stuff, it’s surprising that we remember anything at all consistently.

17

Which reminds me : wasn’t there a case of some Russian (I think) guy who remembered everything (like, say, what he had for dinner on a given day 5 years ago)?

18

Too late to edit :
hyperthymesia :

[QUOTE=Wikipedia]
Individuals with hyperthymesia can recall almost every day of their lives in near perfect detail, as well as public events that hold some personal significance to them. Those affected describe their memories as uncontrollable associations, when they encounter a date, they “see” a vivid depiction of that day in their heads.[3] Recollection occurs without hesitation or conscious effort.

[/QUOTE]

They, at least, don’t seem to have any “storage limit” issue.

19

Whoosh?

20

I am suspicious of these claims. This ability seems to be a carnival act. I’ve seen people demonstrate it, ask them a question about what they were doing on a specific day and they tell you something. There’s no attempt, or way to verify what they report. Somebody mentioned the radio ventriloquist in another thread, it smells like the same thing.