Narcissist : False Allegations From False Memories

. False memories of childhood abuse represent one of psychology’s most contentious topics, often called the memory wars of the 1980s and 1990s and beyond. These involve individuals developing vivid, emotionally charged recollections of sexual or physical abuse that never occurred or that did not happen as remembered. Now, invariably, when somebody mentions being on the receiving end of abuse, be it childhood or that has occurred to them as an adult, there tends to be two schools of thought. There are those that suggest that the victim should always be believed with regard to the allegations that they make. There are others that say, well, it ought to be tested, it ought to be probed, and often the victim is criticized for the amount of time that it has taken them to make mention of the abuse that they allege has taken place. In some instances, there is also the suggestion that the individual might be engaging in bandwagoning, for instance, latching on to the hashtag MeToo movement, because they suggest that there is some kind of opportunity for a payday and fame as a consequence of succeeding in a claim against somebody who is famous, who is alleged to be a perpetrator. In some jurisdictions, victims of such abuse are eligible for payments from the state, and therefore, some suggest that there again is a financial incentive for people to put forward allegations which may not be true. The phenomenon of false memories of childhood abuse gained public attention through high profile therapy cases, lawsuits against therapists, and families torn apart by accusations.

Research shows, that while genuine childhood trauma is tragically common and often remembered, at least in part, human memory is reconstructive and fallible. False memories can form under specific conditions, leading to profound personal and societal harm. Laboratory research demonstrates that false autobiographical memories can be implanted in a minority of people through suggestion. The seminal Lost in the Male study by Elizabeth Loftus and Jacqueline Pickerell in 1995 convinced 25 of participants they had been lost as young children using narratives supposedly from parents. One was fabricated. Participants elaborated details, sometimes with emotional conviction. Subsequent memory implantation studies, often involving doctored photographs, repeated interviews, or guided imagery, reveal similar results. A systematic review by Bruin and Andrews in 2017 of 22 such experiments found that on average around 15 of participants fully accepted a false childhood event as real, reporting recollective experiences, for example visual images, and confidence it had occurred. Broader analyses, including one by Skaborbia et al in 2017, report weighted means around 30 when including partial memories or beliefs, rising with self relevant details, or repeated probing. Negative events, for instance, being hospitalised, receiving an enema, or even committing a crime, have been implanted mirroring some features of abuse like shame or pain. Importantly, these rates are not trivial but require effort.

Multiple sessions, authority figures, experimenters posing as having parental confirmation, and techniques like imagination inflation, repeatedly visualising the event. Full blown vivid false memories are rarer than partial beliefs or increased confidence. Recent replications and critiques suggest even lower rates under stricter criteria, sometimes as low as 5 to 14 percent for confidently held memories. Still, the data does indeed establish that suggestion can create compelling false recollection of childhood events in susceptible individuals. Real world prevalence is harder to quantify precisely as it relies on retrospective reports, retractors, people who later disavow memories, and surveys of therapists or accused families. False memory syndrome is not epidemic, but cases are documented and harmful. Surveys of therapists indicate 20 to 45 per cent of encountered clients recovering previously unrecalled traumatic memories, often abuse related, with some linked to suggestive practices. Among retractors, therapy involvement is striking high, often 75 to 86 per cent with accounts describing therapists suggesting repressed abuse to explain symptoms like depression or anxiety. Accordingly, the intervention of a therapist appears to be a considerable catalyst for these false memories. I’ll return to that presently.

Prospective studies of verified abuse survivors show substantial forgetting. 38 per cent of women with documented childhood sexual abuse did not report it 17 years later, though reasons include ordinary forgetting, avoidance, or non disclosure, rather than any Freudian repression. Memory researchers largely agree that repressed memory, which is unconscious blocking of trauma for years, later recovered intact, lacks strong empirical support. Traumatic events are typically well remembered or involve normal mechanisms like disassociation, deliberate suppression, or reinterpretation. The American Psychologist Association notes that most abuse victims remember all or part of events, though disassociation or delayed recall can occur, but it is rare. False memories, however, are facilitated when therapists assume symptoms signal hidden abuse and employ techniques like hypnosis, age regression, dream interpretation, or guided imagery. Several cognitive and contextual factors converge to be the factors behind these false memories. Memory, it is important to point out, is not a video recording, but a reconstructive process prone to distortion, for instance, source monitoring errors, confusing imagined, dreamed, or suggested events with reality. Key triggers include suggested therapy practices. Therapists convinced of repression May tell clients their problems must stem from unremembered abuse, then encourage visualisation or journaling. Surveys show 40 to 70 per cent of recovered memory cases involve such techniques, though rates have now declined with guidelines. Imagination, repetition. Repeatedly imagining or discussing a plausible event increases belief in detail, imagination inflation. False feedback, for example your symptoms match abuse survivors, amplifies this. Individual vulnerabilities.

Higher suggestibility, fantasy proneness, hypnotisability, disassociation, proneness, or trauma history is linked to false memory risk via overgeneral memory or source confusion. Social and cultural influences. Media portrayals of repression, survivor groups, or family pressure can plant seeds. Emotional arousal negative events are not immune, shame or pain can make implanted memories feel authentic. These factors rarely act alone. A vulnerable client in distress meets a well meaning but must informed therapist using outdated methods leading to elaborated memories that feel real and cause behavioural changes, for instance going no contact with a particular family or family member. The fact is that false memories, particularly in relation to childhood abuse, are something that occur. The research supports that and as you’ve just read, much of the catalyst for it lies with the techniques deployed by the therapist. Now, starting with the therapist, there will be instances where the therapist is well intentioned but not particularly skilled and is using outdated techniques. This results in the creation of a false memory but there’s also the instance, of course, that therapy is an area which attracts a disproportionate amount of narcissists to it as a profession. I have explained in separate works the prevalence of narcissists amongst this profession and provided case studies where narcissist therapists, narcissist psychotherapists have caused problems for particular patients. It stands to reason that the therapist who is a narcissist could well result in the implantation of false memories for a patient because that accords with the pursuit of the prime aims and their narcissistic traits. Their belief that they are special, talented, causes them to believe that they can cure any problem that they’re presented with and therefore, the modus operandi of the narcissism to facilitate that is to plant a false memory, because that then allows the narcissist therapist to assert control over that patient by explaining, I know what’s wrong with you, and I hold the solution.

A patient who presents perhaps with depression and is told this is a consequence of a repressed childhood sexual abuse. And is susceptible As sexual abuse and is susceptible to such a suggestion, may well then look upon the therapist as their savior, that they have unlocked something for them that they’ve been struggling to deal with. Their admiration and gratitude naturally provide fuel and shows that they’re under control. The narcissist therapist also, of course, is able to utilize this as a reason to keep the individual in therapy, thus continuing to assert control over them, continuing to draw fuel from them, and the residual benefit. In relation to payment for their services. Accordingly Given the prevalence of the likelihood of false memories being caused by the application of therapy, it is not difficult to see how this is something that could come about as a consequence of a narcissist therapist being involved. It’s also the case that these memories may well come about as a consequence of the fact. That the patient themselves is a narcissist. As you know, in order to control the moment, to draw fuel in the moment, and maybe even extract a residual benefit, the narcissism is prone to revising history. And in such circumstances, it could well cause a narcissist patient to believe that they have indeed suffered some form of abuse. Furthermore, they may not even necessarily be a patient of a therapist.

The narcissism, in order to assert control over a family member, causes the narcissist to think that that family member, let’s say for example the father, abused them when young. It’s an entirely false memory, but it’s been generated by the revision of history which takes place by the narcissism because it’s. Then allows that narcissist to play the victim, to assert control over the alleged perpetrator, to assert control over other family members by way of their sympathy and support, to generate fuel by way of people’s reactions, and possibly secure a residual benefit by way of some form of compensation or payment. Accordingly, the research shows that false memories arising from childhood abuse or believe childhood abuse do exist, and that the most likely Outcomes are that they are either as a consequence of a suggestible patient who is being guided by an inexperienced and outdated therapist, albeit well intentioned or that they are being guided by a narcissist therapist whose narcissism utilizes the implantation of a false memory as a means to pursue the prime aims, or that the individual who Claims sexual abuse is a narcissist themselves, and the narcissism uses the invention of a sexual abuse, either as a child or as an adult, as a means to pursue the prime aims. Now, naturally, this is not to suggest that all instances of the memory of some form of abuse are false. Many are entirely legitimate and result in people taking appropriate action. Nor does it follow that just because somebody has experienced that, that makes them a narcissist. But where there are false accusations which arise from false memories, and it’s been proven through research this does happen, narcissism, both in terms of the way that a narcissist therapist will use this as a means to pursue the prime aims, or as just how a narcissist will use it for their own victimhood, demonstrates that narcissism is a key component in this matter. Have you ever experienced an instance of being accused of being an abuser by someone who has experienced false accusations from false memories? Is it the case that you’re aware of somebody who’s been falsely accused by somebody exhibiting false memories? Share your thoughts in the comments section.