Pain memory after intracutaneous injection of capsaicin was studied in nine healthy male volunteers. Three different doses of capsaicin (0,05mg, 1mg and 20 mg) were applied in a balanced scheme concerning capsaicin dose, injection site and time of rating. The subjects rated their pain on a visual analogue scale (VAS) running on the program DapSys 3 at four different times: acute, one hour, one day and one week later. The dose of capsaicin injected was readily discriminated in all subjects (all differences p<0.005). Analysing the impact of assessment times on pain rating revealed that subjects were well capable to remember duration and intensity of capsaicin pain (median correlation coefficient: r(0,05mg)=0,824, r(1mg)=0,828; r(20mg)=0,771). However, the magnitude of pain rating varied significantly across assessment times (ANOVA: F(3,288)=9,03; p<<0,001), specifically recall at one hour after capsaicin returned significantly lower pain ratings compared to all other times (approximately 25% lower, p<<0,001). We conclude that by and large explicit pain memory retains reliably the temporal structure of the pain experience. However, the magnitude of pain is likely subject to an emotional-affective evaluation bias. Acknowledgement: Supported by Maifor, DFG and BMBF