Early maladaptive schemas and their relation to personality disorders: A correlational examination in a clinical population.

Personality disorder (PD) pathology has been linked to early maladaptive schemas (EMSs). Because of a large heterogeneity in study populations, sample size, statistical analyses and conceptualizations in the literature, the exact relationships between PDs and EMSs are still unclear. The current study examined the relationship between borderline, dependent, avoidant and obsessive-compulsive PDs, represented dimensionally as number of traits, and 15 different EMSs as measured by the Young Schema Questionnaire (YSQ). A total of N = 130 inpatients took part in the study (Mage = 43.6, gender = 51.5% female). Stepwise regressions indicated that borderline, dependent, avoidant and obsessive-compulsive PD traits were partly characterized by specific EMSs and EMSs grouped as domains (i.e., other-directedness domain for dependent PD and overvigilance for obsessive-compulsive PD) and that relations with a variety of domains and EMSs were overlapping for the PD dimensions (i.e., disconnection and rejection for both borderline and avoidant PDs). This suggests that PDs are reflected by a hybrid model of EMSs, with some EMSs and domains that relate to a broader vulnerability factor for PDs, and other domains that differentially relate to the independent PDs. Findings are informative for clinicians, as various EMSs per PD may be targeted in therapy.

Children's suggestion-induced omission errors are not caused by memory erasure.

We explored whether children's suggestion-induced omission errors are caused by memory erasure. Seventy-five children were instructed to remove three pieces of clothing from a puppet. Next, they were confronted with evidence falsely suggesting that one of the items had not been removed. During two subsequent interviews separated by one week, children had to report which pieces of clothing they had removed. Children who during both interviews failed to report that they had removed the pertinent item (i.e., omission error; n=24) completed a choice reaction time task. In this task, they were presented with different clothing items. For each item, children had to indicate whether or not they had removed it. Significantly more errors were made for those removed items that children failed to report than for those they had not removed. This indicates that children's suggestion-based omission errors are not due to erasure of memories.

Valence and the development of immediate and long-term false memory illusions.

Across five experiments we examined the role of valence in children's and adults' true and false memories. Using the Deese/Roediger-McDermott paradigm and either neutral or negative-emotional lists, both adults' (Experiment 1) and children's (Experiment 2) true recall and recognition was better for neutral than negative items, and although false recall was also higher for neutral items, false recognition was higher for negative items. The last three experiments examined adults' (Experiment 3) and children's (Experiments 4 and 5) 1-week long-term recognition of neutral and negative-emotional information. The results replicated the immediate recall and recognition findings from the first two experiments. More important, these experiments showed that although true recognition decreased over the 1-week interval, false recognition of neutral items remained unchanged whereas false recognition of negative-emotional items increased. These findings are discussed in terms of theories of emotion and memory as well as their forensic implications.

True or false? Memory is differentially affected by stress-induced cortisol elevations and sympathetic activity at consolidation and retrieval.

Adrenal stress hormones released in response to acute stress may yield memory-enhancing effects when released post-learning and impairing effects at memory retrieval, especially for emotional memory material. However, so far these differential effects of stress hormones on the various memory phases for neutral and emotional memory material have not been demonstrated within one experiment. This study investigated whether, in line with their effects on true memory, stress and stress-induced adrenal stress hormones affect the encoding, consolidation, and retrieval of emotional and neutral false memories. Participants (N=90) were exposed to a stressor before encoding, during consolidation, before retrieval, or were not stressed and then were subjected to neutral and emotional versions of the Deese-Roediger-McDermott word list learning paradigm. Twenty-four hours later, recall of presented words (true recall) and non-presented critical lure words (false recall) was assessed. Results show that stress exposure resulted in superior true memory performance in the consolidation stress group and reduced true memory performance in the retrieval stress group compared to the other groups, predominantly for emotional words. These memory-enhancing and memory-impairing effects were strongly related to stress-induced cortisol and sympathetic activity measured via salivary alpha-amylase levels. Neutral and emotional false recall, on the other hand, was neither affected by stress exposure, nor related to cortisol and sympathetic activity following stress. These results demonstrate the importance of stress-induced hormone-related activity in enhancing memory consolidation and in impairing memory retrieval, in particular for emotional memory material.

Children's false memories: easier to elicit for a negative than for a neutral event.

The present study examined the role of valence in the development of children's implanted false memories. Seventy-six 7-year-old children listened to two true and one false narrative. The false narrative was either neutral ("moving to another classroom") or emotional negative ("being accused by the teacher for copying off your neighbor"). In addition, half of the children were presented with their class photograph while listening to the narratives. During two interviews, children recalled as many details as possible from the true and false events. Results showed that the negative event elicited more false memories than the neutral event. The presentation of a true photograph did not promote the development of false memories.

Commission errors but not critical lures decrease when you have to pay a price for them.

Using the Deese-Roediger-McDermott paradigm, we explored the effect of monetary penalty on false memories. Participants were presented 6 15-word lists of semantic associates that all converged on a nonpresented critical lure. Next, half of the participants received a monetary reward (0.10 Euro; about $0.10) for each correctly recalled word, whereas they lost money (0.20 Euro; about $0.20) for each incorrect response. Compared with control participants who received a fixed financial compensation, participants in the experimental group reported fewer commissions (i.e., incorrect responses other than the critical lure). Number of hits and critical lures did not differ between the groups.

Boundary distortions for neutral and emotional pictures.

In two experiments, we examined Safer, Christianson, Autry, and Osterlund's (1998) claim that when emotional material is remembered, tunnel memory (i.e., the tendency to remember less of a scene than was actually shown) occurs. In Experiment 1, 81 undergraduate students drew photographs from memory after having briefly seen either four neutral or four emotional photographs. Both neutral and emotional drawings revealed boundary extension (i.e., the tendency to remember more of a scene than was actually shown). Experiment 2 relied on the camera distance paradigm (Intraub, Bender, & Mangels, 1992). In a recognition test, 60 undergraduate students judged the camera distance of previously seen neutral or emotional photographs. The majority of them demonstrated accurate judgments and neither extended nor restricted picture boundaries. Those participants who made an error more often displayed a boundary extension than a tunnel memory error. Taken together, our results suggest that boundary extension for neutral and emotional photographs is a more robust phenomenon than its counterpart, tunnel memory.

Accuracy, completeness, and consistency of emotional memories.

Judges and lawyers often consider inconsistent testimonies to be inaccurate. We addressed this assumption by asking undergraduate students on 2 occasions to write detailed accounts of violent movie fragments they had seen. These accounts were evaluated in terms of accuracy, completeness, and consistency. Experiment 1 showed that accounts tended to be accurate. Moreover, first accounts were marginally more complete than second accounts. The number of inconsistencies between the 2 accounts was not significantly related to their accuracy. Experiment 2 sought to replicate these findings using a more emotionally upsetting movie fragment. Results were highly similar to those of Experiment 1 in that accounts tended to be accurate but incomplete. Inconsistencies were not significantly related to the accuracy of participants' accounts. In line with previous research, we found that accounts of emotional events can be highly accurate but tend to be incomplete. More importantly, inconsistencies cannot be seen as valid predictors of testimonial inaccuracy.

How children remember neutral and emotional pictures: boundary extension in children's scene memories.

Boundary extension is the tendency to remember more of a scene than was actually shown. The dominant interpretation of this memory illusion is that it originates from schemata that people construct when viewing a scene. Evidence of boundary extension has been obtained primarily with adult participants who remember neutral pictures. The current study addressed the developmental stability of this phenomenon. Therefore, we investigated whether children aged 10-12 years display boundary extension for neutral pictures. Moreover, we examined emotional scene memory. Eighty-seven children drew pictures from memory after they had seen either neutral or emotional pictures. Both their neutral and emotional drawings revealed boundary extension. Apparently, the schema construction that underlies boundary extension is a robust and ubiquitous process.

Validity of the Modified Child Psychopathy Scale for Juvenile Justice Center Residents.

Adult psychopathy has proven to be an important clinical and forensic construct, but much less is known about juvenile psychopathy. In the present study, we examined the construct validity of the self report modified Child Psychopathy Scale mCPS; Lynam (Psychological Bulletin 120:(2), 209-234, 1997) in a sample of 57 adolescents residing in a Dutch juvenile justice center, aged between 13 and 22 years. The mCPS total score was reliably related to high externalizing problems, low empathy, high anger and aggression, high impulsivity, high (violent) delinquency, and high alcohol/drug use. Unique relations were found for the antisocial-impulsive (mCPS Factor 2), but not the callous-unemotional facet of psychopathy (mCPS Factor 1). Our findings support the validity of the mCPS in that it encompasses the antisocial-impulsive facet of psychopathy, but it is less clear whether the mCPS sufficiently captures the affective-interpersonal facet of psychopathy.

Script knowledge enhances the development of children's false memories.

We examined whether script knowledge contributes to the development of children's false memories. Sixty 7-year-old and 60 11-year-old children listened to false narratives describing either a high-knowledge event (i.e., fingers being caught in a mousetrap) or a low-knowledge event (i.e., receiving a rectal enema) that were similar in terms of plausibility and pleasantness. Moreover, half of the children in each condition received additional suggestive details about the false events. Across two interviews, children had to report everything they remembered about the events. Script knowledge affected children's false memories in that both younger and older children developed more false memories for the high-knowledge event than for the low-knowledge event. Moreover, at the first interview, additional suggestive details inhibited the development of children's images into false memories.

Detection of feigned cognitive dysfunction using special malinger tests: a simulation study in naïve and coached malingerers.

The aim of the present study was to compare the accuracy of the Amsterdam Short Term Memory (ASTM) test with that of the Structured Inventory of the Malingered Symptomatology (SIMS) in detecting feigning of cognitive dysfunction in naïve and coached participants. Ninety undergraduate students were administered the ASTM and the SIMS and asked to respond honestly (controls; n = 30), or instructed to malinger cognitive dysfunction due to head injury. Before the both instruments were administered, naïve malingerers received no further information (n = 30), whereas coached malingerers were given some information about brain injury and a warning not to exaggerate symptoms (n = 30). Both tests correctly classified 90% of the naïve malingerers. The ASTM detected 70% of the coached malingerers, whereas the SIMS continued to detect 90% of them. The findings suggest that coaching undermines the diagnostic accuracy of the ASTM, but does not seem to influence the accuracy of the SIMS.

Traumatic memories of war veterans: not so special after all.

Several authors have argued that traumatic experiences are processed and remembered in a qualitatively different way from neutral events. To investigate this issue, we interviewed 121 Croatian war veterans diagnosed with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) about amnesia, intrusions (i.e., flashbacks and nightmares), and the sensory qualities of their most horrific war memories. Additionally, they completed a self-report scale measuring dissociative experiences. In contrast to what one would expect on the basis of theories emphasizing the special status of traumatic memories, amnesia, and high frequency intrusions were not particularly typical for our sample of traumatized individuals. Moreover, traumatic memories were not qualitatively different from neutral memories with respect to their stability and sensory qualities. The severity of PTSD symptoms was not significantly correlated with dissociative experiences. Our findings do not support the existence of special memory mechanisms that are unique to experiencing traumatic events.

Peritraumatic dissociation as a predictor of post-traumatic stress disorder: a critical review.

In psychiatric literature, dissociative reactions at the time of a traumatic event (i.e., peritraumatic dissociation) are considered to be risk factors for the development of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). In this article, we critically review research concerned with the link between peritraumatic dissociation and PTSD. Our main point is that studies in this area heavily rely on retrospective reports of dissociative reactions during the trauma. We argue that this methodology has important limitations since people in general and PTSD patients in particular find it difficult to give accurate descriptions of past emotional states. Restrictive factors that play a role in this context have to do with forgetting, attribution, and malingering.