Freud and False Memory Syndrome

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Since about 1992, an astonishingly fierce scientific professional and legal controversy has arisen around the allegation that psychotherapists may sometimes have fostered false memories of childhood sexual abuse. Some have blamed Freud for this, arguing that he sowed the seeds of "false memory syndrome" 100 years ago. He has been accused by some critics of abandoning, out of professional cowardice, his original recongition of the prevalence of sexual abuse amongst his patients, substituting his theory of childhood sexuality and the Oedipus complex, and by others of fabricating and implanting false memories of abuse in his patientes' minds. Was Freud the bad father, impregnating society with misldeading ideas that a century later have given birth to a monster - or was he an astonishing genius, whose sophisticated understanding of memory was far ahead of his time? Much bashed, but rarely read, Freud continues to be urgently relevant to issues that preoccupy psychology and society today.
About the Author
Phil Mollon is a psychoanalyst, psychotherapist and clinical psychologist. He served on the Working Party on Recovered Memory of the British Psychological Society, and has written widely on the subject.
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In the early 1990s reports emerged of a new mental illness - false memory syndrome - in which people who had undergone psychotherapy or counselling came to 'remember' childhood abuse that had never actually happened. This was alleged to be an 'iatrogenic' condition - that is, one produced by harmful medical or therapeutic practice.
The culprits were said to be psychotherapists who practice 'recovered memory therapy', based on a belief that many forms of adult distress and psychological difficulties may be caused by experiences of sexual abuse in childhood that had been forgotten or 'repressed'.
It was claimed that such therapists would encourage patients to search for repressed memories, perhaps with the aid of special techniques involving hypnosis. Under the persuasive influence of the therapist, patients might come to believe in the reality of what were, in fact, imagined events, might cut themselves off from their family of origin and, even (in the USA), attempt to sue the alleged abuser, often the father. Protestations of innocence and bewilderment might be seen by the patient merely as evidence of the perpetrator's state of denial and inability to acknowledge his (or her) guilt. In these circumstances both the patient and the family could suffer unnecessarily as a result of misleading ideas promulgated in therapy.
When it became recognised that accusations of sexual abuse were becoming increasingly widespread, lobby groups were extablished to provide support for those accused, and also to promote awareness of the uncertainties of memory and disseminate information about 'false memory syndrome'.
Despite the existence of such organisations whose aim is to represent the interests of the relatives of those sufferinf from 'false memory syndrome', and the widespread coverage of this issue in both professionals and the general media, it is surprisingly difficult to find a definiton of this syndrome. Nor does it appear in any textbook of psychiatry, or any official listing of psychiatric or other medical conditions. However, John Kihlstrom, a cognitive psychologist and advisor to the False Memory Syndrome Foundation in the United States, has offered the following definition:
"A condition in which a person's identity and interpersonal relationships are centered around a memory of traumatic experience which is objectively false but in which the person strongly believes. Note that the syndrome is not characterised by false memories as such... Rather, the syndrome may be diagnosed when the memory is so deeply engrained that it orientates the individual's entire personality and lifestyle, in turn disrupting all sorts of other ada