Closed and signed

Physical closure of an object leads to psychological closure, thus helping to deal with a negatively charged memory

By: Miriam Dishon Berkowitz

Each of us has experienced negative events in life, events that we would rather forget. But how can this be done? Is it possible to simply decide consciously and intelligently that we no longer think about the disturbing issue? From a review of the current cognitive literature, it becomes clear that this is not so easy. Previous studies indicate that specific instructions not to think about a certain subject ("don't think about pink elephants") actually lead to increased thinking about the subject.

Writers of popular instructional and self-help books suggest taking all the objects related to that event - for example souvenirs from a painful relationship - and closing them in a box. Is there any real value to these advices, based on the assumption that physical closure will also lead to psychological closure (clousre)? This is the question Yuping Li, Li Yuan Wei and Dilip Soman are trying to answer in a study published in the journal Psychological Science.

80 subjects participated in the first experiment. All participants were asked to recall an event from the recent past that they regret and to write it down. Half of the subjects were asked to put the paper on which they wrote their memory into an envelope and present the envelope to the experimenter. The other half of the subjects were not asked to put the sheet of paper in the envelope, but only to submit it as it is directly to the experimenter. After that, all the subjects received a questionnaire in which they were asked to indicate how they felt about the event from the past that they had just written about.

The analysis of the results shows that subjects who put the paper on which they described the negative event into the envelope reported less negative feelings towards that event than those who simply handed the paper they wrote on to the experimenter. That is, subjects who were involved in creating closure or a physical signature (putting in an envelope) for the negative event, felt a certain emotional relief.

In the second experiment, the researchers sought to reproduce the results of the first experiment, and see if it is possible to generalize its results to other emotional events as well. 40 female students participated in this experiment. In the first part of the experiment, they were all asked to write for ten minutes about a personal wish that was important to them, which they were unable to fulfill. After that, half of the participants put the page they had written on into an envelope and handed it to the experimenter, while half of them did not put the page in the envelope, but handed it directly to the experimenter as is. Finally, all the participants answered a questionnaire in which they were asked to indicate how they now feel about the wish they were unable to fulfill. The analysis of the findings shows that, as in the first experiment, participants who locked their wishes in an envelope felt less negative emotions.

The first two experiments show that the act of closing emotionally charged materials in an envelope helps to alleviate negative emotions. However, a question that still remains open is what is the origin of this effect? Does it result from the act of closing regardless of what was closed or signed, or from the fact that something directly related to the negative emotion was closed or signed?

As an answer to this question, the third experiment was designed. In the third experiment, 80 students participated and all performed three tasks. The first assignment included reading comprehension. The subjects read a sad story and answered in writing a questionnaire in which questions were asked about the story. In the second task, the subjects were asked to answer a series of questions unrelated to the story they read, such as, for example, what they plan to do at the weekend. In the third task, the subjects were asked to report their feelings after reading the story, and then answered a series of questions that tested their memory for details in the story.

The participants were divided into three groups. At the end of the first assignment, the participants of the first group were asked to put the story with the questionnaire they had filled out into an envelope and deliver it to the experimenter. That is, these participants were asked to perform an action of physically closing a material with a negative emotional charge. The participants of the second group were given an envelope only after they handed the first questionnaire to the experimenter, and they were asked to perform the second task and upon completion put the second questionnaire in the envelope and hand it to the experimenter. In other words, these participants were asked to perform an act of physical closure for a material with a neutral emotional charge (their plans for the weekend). Participants in the third group did not receive envelopes.

The analysis of the findings of the third experiment shows that participants who enclosed in an envelope materials with a negative emotional charge reported fewer negative emotions than what the participants in the other two groups reported. Moreover, no difference was found between the feelings of the participants of the second group, who enclosed in an envelope a material with a neutral emotional charge, and between the feelings of participants who did not enclose anything in an envelope. Hence, what brings relief in the psychological feeling is the closure of material directly related to the negative memory, and not the mere act of closure.

And finally, it emerged that the participants who physically closed material with a negative emotional charge to details with a negative emotional charge in the story, their memory was lower than the memory of the participants of the other two groups for such details. This finding is consistent with reports in the literature that people who remember fewer negative details about a past distressing event report better psychological closure.

The three experiments show that the simple metaphorical act of closing a material with a negative emotional charge in an envelope reduces the negative feelings towards the event in question. It is interesting to note that emotional feelings are described in human language through metaphors dealing with the quasi-physical control or suppression of the feeling, for example "conquered his anger". These metaphors may perhaps imply that, as appears from the series of experiments described here, physical actions of closing things in a container may lead to psychological relief, or a feeling of controlling emotions.

Dr. Miriam Dishon - Berkowitz is a psychologist and an organizational and marketing consultant