Zeigarnik Effect

Yesterday, I watched a TikTok video explaining the Zeigarnik Effect. The term was coined by Soviet psychologist Bluma Zeigarnik, who noticed that waiters seemed to remember unpaid orders perfectly but forgot them immediately after the bill was paid. Somehow, the check being settled allowed the waiter to archive the experience in their mind.

Zeigarnik then conducted experiments wherein participants performed simple tasks (like puzzles or math problems). Some were interrupted mid-task; others were allowed to finish. The result was that participants remembered the interrupted tasks about twice as well as the completed ones. The unfinished tasks were like unpaid bills—they lingered in the mind.

The TikTok creator used the Zeigarnik Effect to explain why individuals are typically distraught by being ghosted. If a person breaks up with them, that’s one thing. But if that person just disappears without a word, that’s an entirely different story. The bill was not paid. The task was not done. And that lack of completion is haunting. Just like trauma.

Nightmares are born out of the unconscious and are an expression of repressed trauma. Not only are repressed memories themselves incomplete; the nightmares about the repressed trauma are also incomplete. A trauma survivor will generally wake up at the climax of the terrorizing dream and never experience its conclusion. Moreover, many traumas, like abuse—even if they are fully remembered—are incomplete, as most abusers are never brought to justice.

There is a triple layer of incompletion, exacerbating the Zeigarnik Effect.

Repressed trauma is so haunting and seemingly impossible to put to rest, as there is no closure for events that you can’t fully recall. Remembered trauma can be equally haunting because abusers typically do not face the consequences of their actions. Today, one of my patients, who has been working on her trauma issues for the past seven years, told me that her abuser recently wrote her an email that said, “Prove it, bitch.”

Whether in your nightmares or your inbox, these monsters are like the bills that never get paid, and healing becomes an interrupted task for the survivor.