ABSTRACT
One of the commonest forms of dissociative symptom is simple functional amnesia. The patient, after some shock, slight or severe, finds himself unable to recall some tract of his past life; so far as voluntary recall is concerned a section of his past is blotted out, a section which may have been of a few seconds’ duration only or may extend through many years. Most commonly such a forgotten section is one immediately preceding the moment of shock; a case of this kind is called one of retro-active amnesia. In the more extreme of such cases, the forgotten section includes the whole of the patient’s life preceding the moment of dissociating shock. He may retain all his general comprehension of things and his powers of adjustment; his speech and understanding of spoken and written language are not impaired; his character remains substantially unchanged: but he is unable to recollect any particular fact or circumstance of his past life; his name, his occupation, his home, his wife and children are all forgotten.
