Making Monsters: False Memories, Psychotherapy, And Sexual Hysteria [Paperback]

Richard Ofshe (Author), Ethan Watters (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 24, 1996

In the last decade, reports of incest have exploded into the national consciousness. Magazines, talk shows, and mass market paperbacks have taken on the subject as many Americans, primarily women, have come forward with graphic memories of childhood abuse. Making Monsters examines the methods of therapists who treat patients for depression by working to draw out memories or, with the use of hypnosis, to encourage fantasies of childhood abuse the patients are told they have repressed. Since this therapy may leave the patient more depressed and alienated than before, questions are appropriately raised here about the ethics and efficacy of such treatment.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This is the most thoroughgoing and powerful critique to date of the use of recovered memories in psychotherapy. Many retrieved memories of childhood sexual abuse, the authors argue, are fabrications generated in a coercive, highly charged atmosphere using questionable therapeutic techniques such as hypnosis, dream analysis, artwork and the constant revisiting and rewriting of vague early memories. Ofshe, a social psychology professor at UC Berkeley and a Pulitzer-winning reporter, and freelance writer Watters extend their analysis to include alleged sufferers of multiple-personality disorder and people who claim to have been abused or tortured by satanic cults that engage in sacrificial murder and rape. The authors name names, attacking therapists, experts and writers, and they cover such well-publicized cases involving recovered memories as the 1990 San Francisco murder trial that convicted George Franklin on the basis of his daughter Eileen Lipsker's accusation that he had killed her childhood friend Susan Nasson 20 years earlier. This report is certain to escalate a heated public debate.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

If you haven't heard of false memory syndrome and the controversy it engenders, you haven't seen a talk show recently. In the last decade, there has been a veritable explosion of cases in which (mostly) women in therapy remember being sexually abused by their parents. In many instances, the memories escalate, and the patients eventually exhibit symptoms of multiple personality disorder or recall being victims of satanic cults. Ofshe, a social psychologist, and Watters, a Mother Jones writer, examine this psychological phenomenon and offer two explanations for its current prevalence: either recovered-memory therapists have achieved a breakthrough in the understanding of the human mind, in which case much that is fundamental about our understanding of psychology will need to be reinterpreted, or the practice of uncovering repressed memories has been built into a pseudoscience by therapists who have created "an Alice-in-Wonderland world in which opinion, metaphor, and ideological preference substitute for objective evidence." Firmly supporting the latter view, the authors offer a thoughtfully written, restrained (even a bit dry), and generally persuasive examination of what false memory syndrome reveals about society as well as ourselves. Ilene Cooper --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 360 pages
• Publisher: University of California Press (September 24, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0520205839
• ISBN-13: 978-0520205833
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #955,213 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Good Critique of the Repressed Memory Movement, July 13, 1999

By 

"slwheelock" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Making Monsters: False Memories, Psychotherapy, And Sexual Hysteria (Paperback)

This book made me think about the power of therapy and the power of therapists. While Ofshe focuses the book on repressed memory and multiple personality disorder (MPD), he makes a clear argument about the many possible negative effects on clients/patients who enage in therapy with unqualified clinicians (or those who have lost sight of the reality & practice of ethical therapy, Dr. B. Braun). I do not believe everything that the authors have written in this book; however, their attempt to scrutinize and understand a very controversial phenomenon is commendable. They obviously did extensive research and present a good argument, but their biases are clear. There are many good reasons to read this book... to understand biases of authors, clinicians, the controversy of repressed memory and MPD, and the possible negative consequences of working with unqualified therapists. Our society stereotypes and belittles people with mental illnesses, as well as the many people who treat them. Yet, there are many successes found in the field of psychotherapy. Just don't look to this book for a positive respresentation of psychology professionals. This book highlights a current controversy in the mental health world. While it may appear to attempt to demean all therapy, don't let it. Read this book as critically as Ofshe wrote it and remember it is NOT about all therapy, therapists, or mental health professionals. And take note: empower yourself if you are a client and if you are a therapist, remember your ultimate responsibility is to your clients' well-being and mental health -- 1st rule: Do No Harm.

31 of 44 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Expose of another New Age "therapy" concoction., December 8, 1999

By 

Timothy P. Scanlon (Hyattsville, MDUSA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Making Monsters: False Memories, Psychotherapy, And Sexual Hysteria (Paperback)

What is called "psychotherapy" has been under fire these days, at long last. "Disorders" such as "Multiple Personality Disorder" and its variations have been questioned even by the profession who created them; the tendency, from the movements of the '60s, I suppose, to make victims of those who claim that status, based not on evidence but on "recovered memories" and one of its more devestating, if not comical manifestions "Satanic Ritual Abuse" (SRA) have been challenged. This book offers a fine, well-researched challenge.

The victimology phenomenon has been a media gold mine. Someone finds that--usually she--had been sexually abused by dad, bro', or Uncle Bert--something she found out with the "help" of her "therapist"--and goes to the TV news. The mere abuse grows as does the celebrity and the income of the alleged victim, into unspeakable horrors. But, for something so uncanny and bizarre, for shame, no evidence is available! That doesn't impede overzealous prosecutors and courts from filling yet another jail cell indefinitely.

I guess what amazes me is that some people don't see through the rubbish that has ruined families, sent countless innocent people to jail terms, and sent some overzealous police (who should be locked up!) on wild goose chases, wasting the public's--yes YOUR--money to do so.

This book exposes much of that, finally.

It does have its amusing portions, like the revelation that the author of "Michelle Remembers" and the alleged victim whose story is the content of the book, good Christians, I'm sure, left their spouses after doing the "research" that led to the book and lived happily ever after. Another couple of families down the drain in the search for celebrity.

Then there's the other best sellers written by people with no psychological expertise or training, just their hearts in the right place. Yeah...

But by and large the book should frighten the reader, and incite him or her to do something about it.

21 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Hard look at recovered memories, August 3, 2000

By 

Bobby Newman (Long Beach, NY USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Making Monsters: False Memories, Psychotherapy, And Sexual Hysteria (Paperback)

For anyone interested in the "recoverd memory" movement, this is a must read. It is well-researched and hard-hitting. It approaches the field with a critical eye, and highlights the damage uncritical acceptance can bring. The stories of families torn apart are heart-breaking, and the stories of therapists engaging in fanciful conspiracy theories are chilling.