ON THE TRUE-FALSE MEMORY SYNDROME - THE PROBLEM OF CLINICAL-EVIDENCE

Faced with a lack of external confirmatory data and basing their judgm ents on sometimes dubious evidence, psychoanalytic clinicians are face d with a need to establish criteria on which to base decisions regardi ng historic truth, however lacking in certainty. This report, not a ch aracteristic case history, endeavors to establish some standards that may enable analysts to decide between historic and psychic reality. Da ta from a case of ''true-false'' memory syndrome will be presented to illustrate both the problem and tentative attempts at solution.