<p>Few of the former residents of East Germany have chosen to view the files kept on them by the communist secret police; scholars have investigated this as an example of strategic ignorance that can help individuals function and preserve social harmony. </p>
The former East German secret police, the Stasi, spied on people for years. But when given access to the Stasi files, most people didn’t want to read them, researchers found.
A new study explored reasons why some citizens of the former East Germany chose not to view files that the Stasi, the notorious secret police force, kept of them when the archives were opened in 1991. The study was published in the journal Cognition. .
When East Germany collapsed, millions of the Stasi’s victims choose to remain in ignorance about their oppressors. Is it sometimes better to forget the past than to investigate it?<br>
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