Freud Discovers Childhood

FREUD DISCOVERS
CHILDHOOD SEXUAL ABUSE

In Freud's opinion, his new method of probing a
patient's memories without hypnosis produced longerlasting cures than the cathartic method using hypnosis.
His patients retained a clear memory of the therapy
itself, and they could think about what they had learned
while they were away from the doctor. Because the
technique did not require hypnosis, it could be used on
everybody.
With uncanny reliability, the procedure revealed
traumatic incidents responsible for the first symptoms of
hysteria. For example, an eighteen-year-old girl who
was troubled by anxiety attacks and shortness of breath
lost her symptoms when (with great outpouring of
emotion) she remembered her father's attempt to
seduce her when she was fourteen.
Another patient, secretly in love with her sister's
husband, was cured when she remembered standing at
her dying sister's bedside and thinking an awful
thought: "Now he is free again and I can be his wife."
When she remembered the incident, her symptoms of
anxiety became worse for a time, then her symptoms
went away.
What pattern did Freud claim to have found, by 1896?
By 1896, Freud claimed to see a definite pattern in

memories his patients expressed during cathartic
episodes. They always involved sex, or some
connection with sex. In fact, with a little prodding, every
one of his patients could remember being victimized by
seduction attempts during childhood. Freud wrote:
What did Freud think was the specific cause of hysteria?
The event of which the subject has

retained an unconscious memory is a
precocious [unusually early] experience
of sexual relations with actual excitement
of the genitals, resulting from sexual
abuse committed by another person; and
the period of life at which this fatal event
takes place is earliest youththe years
up to the age of eight or ten, before the

child has reached sexual maturity. A
passive
sexual
experience
before
puberty: this then is the specific aetiology
[cause] of hysteria.
...In some eighteen cases of hysteria I
have been able to discover this
connection in every single case and,
where the circumstances allowed, to
confirm it by therapeutic success.
(1962/1896, p.199)
Then Freud changed his mind. In a decision that is still
hotly debated, Freud declared that many of these
memories were fantasies or confabulations (false
memories ) rather than actual recollections of seduction
attempts. It did not matter, he said, because the false
memories still showed how a person was thinking and
feeling in childhood. Freud had a strong commitment to
his theory of the family drama, which included the idea
of sexual fantasies in childhood, so in a sense it did not
matter to Freud if the memories of sexual abuse in
childhood were accurate or not; they reflected what he
believed was a universal emotional drama of childhood.
Some present-day psychologists think Freud was
correct in identifying many of the memories as
confabulations, because Freud was encouraging
particular types of memories under a state resembling
hypnosis, and false memories easily occur under such
circumstances. Others think Freud made a huge
mistake, because childhood sexual abuse is actually
quite common and can indeed cause troubling
aftereffects later in life.
How might his "19th patient" have influenced Freud?
Why did Freud change his mind and decide his patients
were fabricating their memories? We cannot know for
sure, but some scholars suggest Freud was influenced
by his "nineteenth patient"himself. Freud carried out a
very thorough (Freudians sometimes say "heroic") selfanalysis in 1897. During that time, Freud decided he
and his brothers and sisters all showed signs of
hysterical behavior. If these symptoms were always
related to perverse sexual experiences, as Freud
believed, it would imply that Freud's father molested his
children, which was unthinkable. So (according to this
theory) Freud decided his patients' early recollections

were just fantasies. That let his father off the hook.
What is evidence that Freud avoided blaming fathers?
There is other evidence that Freud had a hang-up

about guilty fathers. Florence Rush, who
researched the topic for her book, The Best Kept
Secret, pointed out that Freud went to
extraordinary lengths to avoid blaming fathers in
print, even when it meant changing the facts.
Freud referred to seductions by governesses,
sisters, brothers, aunts and uncles, but never
fathers. A case described earlierthe 18-year-old
who was molested at age 14was initially
published in an article where Freud blamed her
uncle. Only 30 years later, in 1925, did Freud
reveal that the "uncle" was actually her father.
This all makes it sound like Freud was engaged in
some kind of cover-up, and his patients were
having accurate memories. But matters are not
necessarily so simple. Probably some of Freud's
patients did make up false memories. Freud urged
them to have such memories while they were lying
quietly in a state similar to hypnosis. Modern
psychologists know that hypnotized people easily
confabulate (make up) memories at the suggestion
of the hypnotist, and later they are unable to
distinguish the hypnotically-induced fantasies from
genuine memories.
What is some evidence that memories of sexual abuse can be forgotten? Why is this not
necessarily compelling evidence for repression?
This whole recovered memory issue has become quite

controversial. Some psychologists maintain that there is
no good evidence of memory repression as a
phenomenon. Others point to data showing that some
people do indeed forget sexual abuse. Psychologist
Linda Meyer Williams found that 38 of 100 women with
a history of childhood sexual abuse documented in their
hospital records could not remember the incidents as
adults (Bower, 1993). However, memory for all life
events is full of gaps. Elizabeth Loftus, a prominent
memory expert, cites data showing that memories of
sexual abuse are forgotten (and remembered) at rates
no different from other life experiences (Holden, 2000).
Perhaps some of Freud's patients were retrieving
genuine memories and others were having false
memories because of Freud's probing questions. It
does seem somewhat unlikely that 18 patients in a row
were suffering from the same problem.
What did Freud eventually decide?
Eventually Freud decided it might not matter whether

the memories were true or false, because they
functioned psychologically as if they were true. Freud
started to put less emphasis on recollections.
Eventually Freud stopped trying to eliminate symptoms
one by one and concentrated on long-lasting change in
the whole person (a goal he never achieved, according
to some criticsFreud only published a handful of case
histories, and none showed consistent long-term
improvement). But Freud never minimized the
importance of catharsis. He wrote in 1925:
The cathartic method was the immediate
precursor of psycho-analysis; and, in
spite of every extension of experience
and every modification of theory, is still
contained within its nucleus.

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FREUD DISCOVERS

CHILDHOOD SEXUAL ABUSE

By 1896, Freud claimed to see a definite pattern in

The event of which the subject has

up to the age of eight or ten, before the

theory) Freud decided his patients' early recollections

There is other evidence that Freud had a hang-up

This whole recovered memory issue has become quite

What did Freud eventually decide?

Eventually Freud decided it might not matter whether

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