Use of Memory Reconsolidation in Psychotherapy and Suggestions for a Brain Imaging Study

The recent discovery by brain scientists of the reconsolidation of memory circuits (see research bibliography below) overturned the almost century-old tenet that emotional learnings and acquired responses maintained in long-term implicit memory are indelible—unerasable and permanent for the lifetime of the individual. Reconsolidation, induced endogenously through behavioral procedures, has been shown by neuroscientists to actually eliminate a target implicit memory trace, rendering it impossible to reactivate, in sharp contrast with extinction, which merely suppresses conditioned responses without erasing them, allowing relatively easy reactivation.