An Irrepressible Idea - Newsweek Periscope - MSNBC.Com

Science: An Irrepressible Idea - Newsweek Periscope - MSNBC.com http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3919209/

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Science: An Irrepressible Idea

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Jan. 19 issue - Remember "repressed memory"? • Amazing All-Star show for Anderson In the 1990s it dominated headlines so much that • Peanuts shed fat stigma, stage comeback you may well have wanted to repress the whole • Al Qaeda: Would-Be GI Spy? Newsweek phenomenon yourself. Courts became clogged • Pam Anderson happy to be single Subscribe Now with cases based on memories of abuse the • Pamela Anderson becomes U.S. citizen Periscope plaintiffs had suddenly "recovered," and even National News Lucy from "Peanuts," in doctor mode, made a MOST POPULAR Politics diagnosis: "The fact that you can't remember Most Viewed • Top Rated • Most E-mailed World News being abducted by aliens and satanically abused," • The New Superfoods International Ed. she told Charlie Brown, "is proof that it really • With No Boys to Ogle, We Had Time to Learn War in Iraq happened." • Time to Cram for Medicare Business Story continues below ↓ • Lawrence’s Lessons Enterprise • Widening Rift advertisement Tech & Science • Most viewed on MSNBC.com Healthbeat Society GULF HURRICANES Complete Coverage Education • Lessons from a Deadly Season Entertainment • Another Reason to Digitize Tip Sheet Records Columnists • Portrait of the Poor: An Letters & Live Talks Interactive Multimedia/Photos • Faces of Katrina: A Photo Search the Site Essay Search Archives • Get a free State Farm Life Needs Analysis. U.S. News PERISCOPE World News Business Sports Scientists scoffed, of course. In many cases, Entertainment therapists had planted ideas in their patients' Tech / Science minds. "There was an abundance of evidence that Health people could come to remember things they'd Weather never experienced," says University of Oregon

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Travel Blogs Etc. psychologist Michael Anderson. And if people could in • Bird Flu: Top-Secret Briefings Local News fact repress real memories, there was little Short on Top-Secret Info? Newsweek physiological evidence of it, much less an • CW: Second-Term Blues Edition Multimedia "abundance." But times change, and Anderson • Race: The GOP's 'Disturbing News Video thinks he now has some. In this week's Science he Comments' • Stem Cells: New Ways to Create Most Popular makes the controversial argument that subconscious New Lines? NBC NEWS memory repression really does exist—and that it's MSNBC TV merely the sum of conscious attempts to ignore • More Periscope Today Show particular memories. "If people push something out Nightly News of mind systematically, later on when they want to recall it, they can't," he says, adding that the NEWSLETTER Meet the Press principle should apply to all situations—not just Dateline NBC Sign up for our Web-Exclusive Alert traumatic ones. Based on that idea, Anderson SUBSCRIPTIONS • Click here to have the latest from Newsweek hooked people up to an fMRI machine and asked delivered to your inbox them to actively try to forget a set of words he'd taught them. The scans showed a strange Add RSS feed for this topic • Subscribe interaction between the prefrontal cortex and the • Renew hippocampus—a pattern specific to memory

• Change Address suppression. Sure enough, subjects couldn't BLOG TALK • Give a Gift remember the words later. Asked if an MRI could Read what bloggers are saying about this • Manage Your someday discriminate between real repressed Account Newsweek article memories and suggested ones, Anderson says, There are no posts that link to this article yet. See "We're very far from that," then hesitates. "Well, the most blogged about articles on Newsweek. MORE there might be—I'm just not gonna go there." Fine, • Looking for a but what's he repressing? degree from a quality school? Discover —Mary Carmichael FROM SLATE Newsweek distance © 2005 Newsweek, Inc. • Who Is Scooter Libby? learning.com The secretive Cheney aide at the heart of the CIA leak case. Rate this story Low High Sponsored Feature • Masterpiece Theatre Current rating: 0 by 0 users • View Top Rated stories • Newsweek Thirty-five years of unflinching showcase.com—your refinement. resource for health, education and Print this Email this business opportunities

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