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Am J Psychiatry 1997; 154:173-177
Copyright © 1997 by American Psychiatric Association
Consistency of memory for combat-related traumatic events in veterans of Operation Desert Storm
SM Southwick, CA Morgan 3rd, AL Nicolaou and DS Charney
Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Conn., USA.
OBJECTIVE: The nature of traumatic memories is currently the subject of
intense scientific investigation. While some researchers have described
traumatic memory as fixed and indelible, others have found it to be
malleable and subject to substantial alteration. The current study is a
prospective investigation of memory for serious combat-related traumatic
events in veterans of Operation Desert Storm. METHOD: Fifty- nine National
Guard reservists from two separate units completed a 19- item trauma
questionnaire about their combat experiences 1 month and 2 years after
their return from the Gulf War. Responses were compared for consistency
between the two time points and correlated with level of symptoms of
posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). RESULTS: There were many instances of
inconsistent recall for events that were objective and highly traumatic in
nature. Eighty-eight percent of subjects changed their responses on at
least one of the 19 items, while 61% changed two or more items. There was a
significant positive correlation between score on the Mississippi Scale for
Combat-Related Posttraumatic Stress Disorder at 2 years and the number of
responses on the trauma questionnaire changed from no at 1 month to yes at
2 years. CONCLUSIONS: These findings do not support the position that
traumatic memories are fixed or indelible. Further, the data suggest that
as PTSD symptoms increase, so does amplification of memory for traumatic
events. This study raises questions about the accuracy of recall for
traumatic events, as well as about the well-established but retrospectively
determined relationship between level of exposure to trauma and degree of
PTSD symptoms.
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