Seeking the middle ground in the ‘memory wars’

In the last decade, psychologists have become involved in one of their most contentious debates to date—contentious enough that Pezdek and Banks refer to it as close to a ‘religious war’ (Pezdek & Banks, 1996, p. xii). They are not far wrong. The recovered memory debate has divided professional organizations resulting in a substantial loss of membership. Some of the major organizations have been unable to reach a consensus beyond the most basic of guidelines concerning professional practice (Royal College of Psychiatry; see Brandon et al., 1997; American Psychological Association; see Alpert et al., 1996). In fact, the British Psychological Society was the only professional body to produce a report and guidelines that met with the approval of all the members of their working party (Andrews et al., 1995), if not all members of the society (see Weiskrantz, 1995).