Flashbacks, intrusions, mind-wandering – Instances of an involuntary memory spectrum: A commentary on Takarangi, Strange, and Lindsay (2014)
Introduction
Takarangi, Strange, and Lindsay (2014) examined whether individuals who had just witnessed a shocking film would think about this film during an unrelated reading task without being aware of it. For this purpose, participants in two separate experiments were instructed to press a button each time they caught themselves thinking about the trauma film while performing the reading task. The authors referred to these self-reports as “mind-wandering with awareness”. In each study, a subset of participants were additionally asked, at unpredictable times and independently of the self-caught mind wandering, whether they were currently thinking about the trauma film. When participants affirmed these probes, the researchers counted this as “mind-wandering without awareness”. In the two experiments, the authors found that participants “mind-wandered without awareness” on average on 29% and 40% of the probes.
Mind-wandering without awareness also had cognitive side effects, in that it correlated with deteriorated performance on the reading task. This correlation did not emerge for self-caught mind wandering. The authors subsequently discussed that their findings bring together two lines of research; one using paradigms that probe meta-awareness during mind-wandering (Schooler, 2002; for review, see Smallwood & Schooler, 2015), and another one using the trauma-film paradigm (Holmes & Bourne, 2008) to study involuntary negative memories that serve as a laboratory analogue for trauma memories in post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Thereby, their article suggests new and interesting routes of research on uncharted territory.
In this commentary, we argue that while Takarangi et al. (2014) describe a promising new line of research, the authors have used certain terminology in a rather liberal, and perhaps even conceptually ambiguous, way. Essentially, in our opinion, mind-wandering without awareness is distinct from other forms of involuntary memory. More importantly, we believe that not distinguishing between mind-wandering and other types of involuntary memory has the potential to unlock a conceptual fuzziness in the trauma-memory literature. Below, we elaborate on our main objection to the way the authors presented their findings. Then, we sketch in what way phenomena such as mind-wandering, intrusions, and flashbacks should be viewed in order to avoid confusion and unnecessary controversy. Finally, we briefly outline implications for future research and indicate how clearer definitions may advance the field.
Section snippets
The giant leap from mind wandering to trauma intrusions
Takarangi et al. (2014) claimed to investigate whether “people would sometimes fail to recognise the occurrence of traumatic intrusions” (p. 298). Based on the observation that participants were sometimes caught mind-wandering without reporting it, the authors came to the conclusion that “self-report may underestimate intrusions” (title). We argue that equating mind wandering with traumatic intrusions is a conceptually big leap, which carries with it the risk of exacerbating an already existing
The spectrum of involuntary trauma memories
Despite the above-mentioned critique that mind-wandering should not be fully equated with intrusions and traumatic flashbacks, we agree with Takarangi et al. (2014) that these phenomena are spontaneous thought processes that may be closely related to each other. Studying similarities and differences between these phenomena can yield important insights in trauma memory, but in our opinion, this requires the a priori setting of clear definitions. Indeed, Kvavilashvili (2014) recently argued along
Implications and conclusion
In the present commentary, we propose that dissociative flashbacks, intrusive memories, involuntary autobiographical memories, and now also mind-wandering, can all be regarded as instances on a spectrum of involuntary trauma memory phenomena. However, a clear definition is necessary for each of these concepts in order to avoid confusion and unnecessary controversy. We here present them on a spectrum that is based on the prior work of Kvavilashvili (2014), extended with the suggestion by
References (34)
- et al.
Emotional memory is perceptual
Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry
(2005) - et al.
Unnoticed intrusions: Dissociations of meta-consciousness in thought suppression
Consciousness and Cognition
(2013) - et al.
Neural correlates of exposure to traumatic pictures and sound in Vietnam combat veterans with and without posttraumatic stress disorder: A positron emission tomography study
Biological Psychiatry
(1999) - et al.
A cognitive model of posttraumatic stress disorder
Behaviour Research and Therapy
(2000) - et al.
A comparison of flashbacks and ordinary autobiographical memories of trauma: Cognitive resources and behavioural observations
Behaviour Research and Therapy
(2002) - et al.
Inducing and modulating intrusive emotional memories: A review of the trauma film paradigm
Acta Psychologica
(2008) - et al.
Mental imagery in emotion and emotional disorders
Clinical Psychology Review
(2010) Re-representing consciousness: Dissociations between experience and meta-consciousness
Trends in Cognitive Sciences
(2002)- et al.
Trying to recollect past events: Confidence, beliefs, and memories
Clinical Psychology Review
(2005) - et al.
Self-report may underestimate trauma intrusions
Consciousness and Cognition
(2014)
Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders
The unbidden past: Involuntary autobiographical memories as a basic mode of remembering
Current Directions in Psychological Science
Episodic memory, perceptual memory, and their interaction: Foundations for a theory of posttraumatic stress disorder
Psychological Bulletin
Prospects and problems in studying traumatic flashbacks: Reply to Kvavilashvili (2014)
Psychological Bulletin
Intrusive images in psychological disorders: Characteristics, neural mechanisms, and treatment implications
Psychological Review
Heart rate, startle response, and intrusive trauma memories
Psychophysiology
Remembering to forget: The amnesic effect of daydreaming
Psychological Science
Cited by (15)
Exploring intrusions without awareness: A preliminary study of the characteristics and influences of meta-awareness failures
2023, Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental PsychiatryInvestigating features that contribute to evaluations of intrusiveness for thoughts and memories
2023, Consciousness and CognitionAcute stress reactivity and intrusive memory development: a randomized trial using an adjusted trauma film paradigm
2022, PsychoneuroendocrinologyCitation Excerpt :Trauma-related involuntary memory phenomena have been conceptualized to lie along a continuum, with overlapping and distinctive quantitative and qualitative characteristics between memory types. In this continuum, PTSD’s intrusive re-experiencing symptoms are placed at its most severe end (Meyer et al., 2014). Yet, trauma-related involuntary memories, including intrusive re-experiencing, are not specific to (prodromal) PTSD and are common after trauma, especially in the first weeks (e.g. Michael et al., 2005).
On the relation between mind wandering, PTSD symptomology, and self-control
2022, Consciousness and CognitionCitation Excerpt :Unintentional mind wandering, however, often occurs without such meta-awareness (e.g., Schooler et al., 2011; Seli, Ralph, et al., 2017; Smallwood et al., 2007). Thus, although we predict an association between PTSD symptomology and mind wandering, there is some evidence to suggest that mind wandering and intrusive thoughts are distinct constructs (Meyer et al., 2015) in which case, we may not observe an associative relationship (see also Berntsen, 2021). In the present study, we examined the relations between mind wandering, self-control, and PTSD symptomology.
Visuospatial context learning and configuration learning is associated with analogue traumatic intrusions
2017, Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental PsychiatryTrauma-related versus positive involuntary thoughts with and without meta-awareness
2016, Consciousness and CognitionCitation Excerpt :These memories share some characteristics with other types of spontaneous thought processes, such as mind wandering (Smallwood & Schooler, 2015), remindings (Hintzman, 2011), “earworms” (Hyman et al., 2015), and traumatic flashbacks (Brewin, 2014). Recent research has focused on whether these phenomena are related, and how they might be differentiated (Kvavilashvili, 2014; Meyer, Otgaar, & Smeets, 2015; Takarangi, Lindsay, & Strange, 2015). Mind-wandering is the shift of attention from external information, such as an ongoing task, toward self-generated, internal information, such as thoughts and memories (Smallwood & Schooler, 2006).