Painful, Emotional Memories are the Hardest to Forget

Filed in archive Studies on August 18, 2007

Who wouldn't want to forget the most painful and most emotional of his/her memories? Of course, anybody would like to forget those that we'd rather forget so that we could move on with our lives, right? But it seems that those exactly what we want to forget are the hardest ones to actually forget.

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill have the scientific example as to why that is the case:

Painful, emotional memories that people would most like to forget may be the toughest to leave behind, especially when memories are created through visual cues.

According to the study's lead author, Keith Payne, an assistant professor of psychology in the College of Arts and Sciences:

"When you're watching the news on television and see footage of wounded soldiers in Iraq or ongoing coverage of national tragedies, it may stick with you more than a newspaper headline.

Even "mild" emotional events, like getting a bad grade on a test or a negative comment from a coworker, can be hard to forget. When people are trying to intentionally forget information, they need to mentally segregate that information and then block off the information they don't want to retrieve.

Our findings add to accumulating evidence that emotion places limits on the ability to control the contents of the mind. Our results suggest that even a relatively mild emotional reaction can undermine intentional forgetting."

However, the researchers said that their findings don't necessarily mean that painful, emotional memories can never be intentionally forgotten -if the motivation to forget is powerful enough and if one is able to handle coping strategies.

They said that a different study would be needed to examine what treatment and coping strategies might be effective in helping people voluntarily forget an unwanted memory.

The above findings appear in the September 2007 print issue of the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology.

Source: University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill