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Probing False Memories
Researchers plumb alien abduction recollections in effort to understand false memories.
by Jessica Cerretani

The image of little green men spiriting away victims to a spaceship for a battery of unpleasant tests is a scene out of science fiction. But for some people, “memories” of alien abduction feel all too real, says Roger Pitman, director of the PTSD Psycho-physiology Laboratory at Massachusetts General Hospital, who has studied how the belief of trauma relates to symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder.

The physical responses of people with established PTSD—sweaty palms and a racing heart, for example—have been cited by some as “proof” of the veracity of recovered memories in people who experience similar symptoms. Working on a team led by Richard McNally, a Harvard psychology professor, Pitman and others challenged the significance of these reactions by testing the physiology of people with false memories. Because it’s difficult to authenticate most recovered memories, such as those of childhood abuse, researchers chose a memory they suspected to be untrue: that of alien abduction. Evidence suggests that people who claim to have been abducted by aliens have instead experienced sleep paralysis, in which a person awakens during REM sleep to temporary muscle paralysis and hallucinations.

McNally, Pitman, and their colleagues looked at ten people who believed they had been abducted by aliens. The subjects described their alleged alien encounters; their stories were recorded and later played back to them while researchers monitored their heart rate and other indicators of stress. The team’s findings came as a surprise: People who claimed to have been abducted exhibited stronger psychophysiological reactions to the abduction recordings than they did to positive and neutral recordings, compared with 12 controls. These responses were similar to those that occur in people with established PTSD when they recall traumatizing events.

The results aren’t proof of alien abduction, Pitman says. Rather, the feelings of fear and helplessness that can accompany sleep paralysis may help explain the subjects’ reactions. “A strong physiological response during sleep paralysis may consolidate the memory of what the person was imagining at that time,” he explains, “even though that memory is false.”

Jessica Cerretani is assistant editor for the Harvard Medical Alumni Bulletin.

Photo: ©iStockPhoto.com/Mikhail Tolstoy