Charcot's bazaar application of his findings do not detract from their validity. Although Freud seemingly abandoned it later the truth of his early work stands. Pierre Janet believe that when people are terrified, their usual cognitive abilities were inadequate to integrate the experience in to the perspective of prior knowledge, causing it to be left unintergrated and yet to persist as a psychological automatism. This state causes reenactment symptoms, and is now referred to as dissociated memories. This is important in memory retrieval.
Stress causes a return to earlier behavior patterns throughout the animal kingdom.
In a state of low arousal animals tend to be curious and seek novelty. When hyperaroused, they will seek the familiar, regardless of the intrinsic rewards or punishment. Thus, shocked animals returned to the box in which they were originally shocked, in preference to less familiar locations not associated with punishment. Punished animals actually increased their exposure to shock as the trials continued. Nonhuman primates subjected to extended periods of abuse may later become reasonably well intergrated socially.