The Social Drama of Corrections

A case history illustrating the use of hypnosis in the retrieval of memory loss due to post-traumatic retrograde amnesia is described. This information was subsequently accepted as admissible in court proceedings. This report has implications for the process of the laying down of memory, and adds support to the retrieval failure hypothesis and the catalogue model of memory formation, with virtually instantaneous encoding of memory. It is also potentially of importance in that it provides a precedent for the acceptance by courts of law of previously amnesic information retrieved by means of hypnosis.