Scientific American Article Summary

The article “Brain Stains” in the October issue of Scientific American was by far the best magazine article I have read. I had two opposite reactions to the article: shock and intrigue…

Shock: Sherri Storm opened the newspaper one February morning only to find a shocker of her own. The headline read, “Malpractice Lawsuit: Plaintiff tells horror of memories. Woman emotionally testifies that psychiatrist planted false recollections.” After reading the story about the woman in the article, Storm realized that she herself had been a victim of malpractice. The 200-plus personalities with which she had been diagnosed by her therapist, Kenneth Olson, had been nothing more than a figment of her imagination.

Like Storm, there are many others who underwent recovered-memory therapy that revealed sordid memories of a fictitious past. When recalling any of these made-up memories, one notices the resonating guided structure, suggesting that the therapist was instrumental in guiding the mind to formulate images of horrid events that fictitiously took place in one’s life.

Although Storm has realized that she does not suffer from Multiple Personality Disorder, she is still traumatized to this day. Seeing a strand of hair on her pizza triggered conjured memories of gagging and eating babies in a cult; Cigar smoke bring recollections of cigar burns and rapes by her Uncle; Even her nurturing parents were seen as criminals against her. She remains unemployed, and socially isolated.


Intrigue: Bad therapy seems to have altered the brain’s emotional circuitry in Storm and others like her, with lasting effects on memory and mental health. While this ‘brain stain’ can be reversed, it would take considerable effort.

The main problem with brain is that it does not have a selective process in information processing. Imagination or coerced memories like the ones mentioned earlier does not go through a screening process to be confirmed, or trashed. In an experiment done by Elizabeth F. Loftus and Jacqueline Pickrell (1995), families were contacted as asked information about their past to gather memories to construct a memory booklet. A false story about being lost in the mall at age 5 was also included. When family members were shown the book, they responded by recalling all of the memories, even that of the false story, providing details of the fictitious event.

Recovered-memory therapy is heavily relient on the notion that some memories are so unreliable that they are repressed by the mind in order to protect itself. On the contrary, Neurobiologist James L. McGaugh of U.C.I. has found that a key function of memory is the ability to recall threatening situations so that they (situations) may be avoided in the future.

Most people don’t realize that when they undergo different types of stress, especially in the case of Chronic Stress, physical changes take place in the brain. The neuronal complexity in three areas is affected: the medial prefrontal cortex (responsible for working memory and executive function), the hippocampus (responsible for learning, memory, and emotional processing), and the amygdale (involved in fear and intense emotions).