Dissociative experiences are related to commissions in emotional memory.
Two rival hypotheses of the link between dissociative experiences and emotional memory were tested: 1) the defence mechanism hypothesis that assumes that dissociation promotes fragmentation of emotional memory; and 2) the fantasy proneness hypothesis that claims that because of its overlap with fantasy proneness, dissociation is related to commissions in emotional memory. Undergraduates scoring high (n = 19) or low (n = 19) on the Dissociative Experiences Scale (DES) listened to an aversive story. Next, a free recall task was administered. While high dissociators made more commission errors in their free recall than did low dissociators, fantasy proneness did not account for this difference.
Candel
I
I
Department of Experimental Psychology, Maastricht University, P.O. Box 616, 6200 MD Maastricht, The Netherlands. i.candel@psychology.unimass.nl
Merckelbach
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H
Kuijpers
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M
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D003674:Defense Mechanisms; D004213:Dissociative Disorders / Q000523:psychology*; D004644:Emotions; D005201:Fantasy; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008568:Memory