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Christine Blasey Ford closes her eyes as she is sworn in before testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearing for Supreme Court nominee Brett Mr. Kavanaugh on Capitol Hill on Sept. 27. (Jim Bourg / Reuters) (JIM BOURG / Reuters)
The politically convenient, scientifically baseless theory that sexual assault so traumatized Christine Blasey Ford she mixed up her attacker is now something like common wisdom for many Republicans.
President Trump regularly endorsed the theory Saturday, shortly after Brett M. Kavanaugh was narrowly confirmed as Supreme Court Judge, telling reporters he was "100 percent" sure Ford accused Kavanaugh in error.
In the same vein, the same notion has been implicated in the rule of law. Kavanaugh without wholly dismissing Ford's accusations – her vivid testimony that he was in the 1980s:
- "I believe that she is a survivor of a sexual assault and that this trauma has lifted her life," said Susan Collins (R-Maine), who gave Kavanaugh his crucial 50th vote.
- "Something happened to Dr. Ford; Brett Kavanaugh, "said Sen. Joe Manchin III (D-W.Va.), The only Democrat to support the nominee.
- "That would get me off the hook of having to make a hard decision," said Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.), One of Kavanaugh's most loyal defenders. "I do not know if this is a case of mistaken identity."
It's easy to forget that, when the mistaken-identity theory was first formulated, it was so much ridiculed that it became more of a reality. But for many cognitive researchers who studies the reality of the traumatic events.
"You are not going to forget that," said Richard Huganir, a neuroscientist at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. "There's a total consensus in the field of memory … If anything, fear and trauma enhances the encoding of memory at a molecular level."
The Washington Post, who is being attacked by the brain with chemicals, including norepinephrine, (Ford, a psychologist herself, even mentioned in her testimony.)
[Unlike Kavanaugh, Christine Blasey Ford was a prosecutor’s dream witness]
It's essentially the same phenomenon that makes people remember when they were doing it when the planes hit the World Trade Center on 9/11, or when they learned John F. Kennedy was shot. It's such a basic tenet of psychology and cognitive science that some researchers watched the mistaken-identity theory spread through the Senate with a sense of stunned dismay.
"Said Ira Hyman, a cognitive psychologist who specializes in traumatic memories at Western Washington University.
"This story [of mistaken identity] That's being offered here – it's a lovely change – but at the same time, it's a narrative that Kavanaugh could not have been the person who did it, "he said. "That's just not consistent with memory research on misidentification."
Sexual assault victims do misidentify their attackers, he noted, but those are almost always attacks by strangers – when the victim's hyperactive memory
Lila Davachi, a cognitive neuroscientist at Columbia University, is an analogical to the traumatic memory formation process to crank up the contrast on a photo – central details get heightened, while those in the background get washed out.
"If someone has a gun you will remember the gun. There's a snapshot of critical features, "she said. "In this case it was a party with friends and she knew him. It is ridiculous to say she would not remember who it was. "
Asked last week if she could have mistaken her attacker, Ford testified that she is "100 percent" certain it was Kavanaugh. She vividly remembered other details of the night – the single beer she drank at the party.
Trump has mocked her story because of these gaps, but it is perfectly consistent with the science of traumatic memory training.
Mara Mather, a professor at the University of Southern California, has made a number of contrasts in their lives. the same chemicals released during trauma.
"I guess the Republicans have been debating things, but that sounds very plausible," she said. "It's about the brain on what's going on at that time. "
Like other researchers, she could not remember a single case of a sexual assault victim misremembering a known attacker – save for rare instances in which people, often children, were coached into falsely accusing friends and family members.
"According to her account, she never forgot about this," Mather noted. "She tried to."
Also like other researchers, she said Kavanaugh's memory was more likely to be suspect than Ford's, if he was a heavy drinker in high school.
"I could see a very plausible scenario where they are both telling the truth they know it, and he is forgetting something that happened when he was drunk," she said.
More reading:
Unlike Kavanaugh, Christine Blasey Ford was a prosecutor's dream witness
How alcohol blackouts and blocks
'Willing to go to the mat': How to Trump and Republicans with Kavanaugh to the cusp of confirmation
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