Ferroelectric properties of metal/ferroelectric/metal capacitors can be severely degraded during FRAM® integration in a hydrogen containing ambient. To understand the mechanism of hydrogen damage we characterized ferroelectric capacitors with the configuration of Pt/PLZT/Pt and Pt/SBTN/Pt annealed in the temperature range of 50°C to 200°C using hysteresis and DC pulsing. The capacitors were stored in specific remanent states (negative, positive, and zero) by poling prior to annealing. The annealing was carried out in a forming gas ambient, containing 1% hydrogen and 99% nitrogen. The degradation is strongly dependent on the polarity of the remanent polarization. From the results, we propose an empirical model of the formation of a fixed dipole layer at the top electrode-ferroelectric interface and we confirm that the polarity of this charge is positive.