The Psychophysiological Differentiation of Emotional Memories

Participants' heart rate and skin resistance responses to emotional memories (fear, anger, joy, sadness, and embarrassment) were studied to determine if the recollection of emotion is sufficient to produce psychophysiological changes, to determine if such changes differ for the various emotions, and to determine the relationship between imaginal abilities and psychophysiological responses to emotional memories. The Absorption Scale of the Multidimensional Personality Questionnaire was used as the measure of imaginal ability [1]. A repeated measures analysis of variance indicated significant differences for skin resistance but not heart rate among emotional memories, F(5,75) = 4.22, p= .002. Recollection of emotional memories, therefore, can produce psychophysiological changes in skin resistance which resemble emotions in real-life circumstances. A theoretical framework for interpretation of results on emotional memories is presented.