• The clinical theory of the repetition compulsion is sometimes taken to mean that neurotic persons, when traumatized, will develop compulsive repetitions of the trauma. Our experiment suggests that there is a more general effect—that various types of persons, after a variety of stressful events, will tend to develop intrusive and stimulus-repetitive thought; the stress itself does not necessarily have to have a negative valence. Equivalent effects were noted after stimuli that aroused positive emotions and after those stimuli that aroused dysphoric affects.