Abuse memories theory ‘should not go unchallenged’

Dan Buckley and Colette Keane

The conference at University College Cork, hosted by the Cork Sexual Violence Centre, yesterday heard an address on the subject by Ellen Bass and Laura Davis, co-authors of The Courage To Heal, a guide for survivors of child sexual abuse. The book has caused dismay among many psychiatrists and therapists since it was published in 1988.

“We do favour free speech,” a spokeswoman for the ICP said. “What we take exception to is the fact that no-one else at the conference was there to present an alternative view.”

Dr Patricia Casey, Professor of Psychiatry at UCD, said the authors’ techniques for recovering dormant memories in patients could lead to false memories and horrific mistakes.

“The only valid way of demonstrating that someone has been sexually abused is if the person spontaneously says so and you can get corroborative evidence for that,” Dr Casey said.

“Everyone thinks a recalled memory is like a movie and is an accurate record of actual events. That is not the case,” she added.

However, speaking at the conference yesterday, Ms Bass said that how and what people remember varies greatly. People who have suffered abuse as children often minimise the impact the abuse had on them in order to cope and sometimes they have selective or partial memory. She said it was up to the therapist to ensure that while the survivor feels she is being believed, the memory is not seen as a concrete recreation of the past.

“It is extremely rare that what a survivor remembers is not meaningful, but you can’t set that memory permanently in concrete. Everything is important, but it just may not be the final picture of what happened,” Ms Bass said.

The conference continues today.