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The term “engram” was first used by German zoologist Richard Semon to describe a stored impression that could be awakened. L. Ron Hubbard used the term in Scientology to refer to a mental image created from a past moment involving severe emotional pain. The current definition of an engram by Scientologists is that it is a complete picture that recalls all the details of a traumatic event. Psychologists would disagree with Hubbard’s definition, but it has a psychological basis.
An engram is a term used extensively in Scientology although the concept predates the founding of Scientology and is actually based in medicine. The term was first invented by Richard Semon, a German zoologist and biologist. Semon used the term to describe a stored impression or stimulus impression. Under certain circumstances the impression could be awakened. This is very much in line with Freud’s ideas of memories stored deep in the mind, which could be slowly brought into consciousness to prevent them from driving current activities and thought patterns.
L. Ron Hubbard used the term in Scientology, although he initially called the engram a Norn, to refer to a mental image created from a past moment involving severe emotional pain. For Hubbard, pain was not easily accessible to the conscious mind, but just as Freud states, it had to be addressed to help the person along the path of self-knowledge and total consciousness. Even though Hubbard has dismissed psychology as pseudoscience, the use of the engram shows that he leans heavily on the concept. What differs is his way of accessing the mental image.
The current definition of the engram by Scientologists is that it is a complete picture that recalls all the details of a traumatic event. A person, if he could access all the details, would be able to remember everything that was happening at the time: the smell of things, the things that were said, the expressions on other people’s faces. This trace memory would unconsciously affect the reactive mind, creating feelings of illness, emotional or physical pain, or sudden negatively directed feelings. Events in the present can stimulate engrams, causing people to suddenly experience negative and unwanted symptoms that seem to have no explanation. An example could be the following:
A little girl was scolded by her mother for cutting some of the roses in her mother’s garden. As an adult, this woman gets headaches whenever she smells roses, leading her to conclude that she must be allergic to perfume. Scientology would explain this as the result of engram activity unconsciously. If the engram were to be addressed and brought to light, then theoretically the smell of roses would no longer give this woman a headache.
Psychologists today would probably disagree with Hubbard’s definition of an engram, especially in his contention that this mental picture contains wholly and entirely the trauma event. Most agree that even though memories are discovered by techniques such as hypnosis, they are always colored by the perception of the individual. Furthermore, false memories, events that never happened, can be retrieved, suggesting that Hubbard’s definition does not fully account for the complexities of the mind. However, it has a psychological basis, which is ironic given Hubbard’s attack on discipline.
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