The Effect of Attachment on Post-Psychotic Trauma in First Episode Psychosis

Abstract

Objective: To further understand the role that attachment plays in post-psychotic trauma of the first episode of psychosis. Design: A systematic review was conducted, reviewing and appraising the current literature of trauma, attachment, and first episode psychosis in clinical samples. Methods: Research utilizing East Carolina University’s One Search, a database of all available articles to the university using the keywords trauma, attachment, first episode psychosis. Twenty-eight articles were identified that studied attachment’s effect on the trauma of first episode psychosis. Results: The authors identified and themed articles (n=28). The themes included early trauma, mentalization, symptomatology, attachment type, anxiety disorder, coping, and adjustment/recovery. There were also several that were outliers. The themes amongst the outliers were mindfulness, symptomatology, metacognition, recovery, coping, and personality disorder that appeared to be unrelated to the other articles in the systematic review. Conclusion: Attachment appears to have a correlation with post-psychotic recovery and trauma. Almost 50% of the articles (n=12) across multiple disciplines appear to support the same thesis statement that individuals with insecure type attachment (avoidant or anxious) were more prone to developing maladaptive coping schema, whereas the securely attached patients were more likely to recover without as many maladaptive coping skills.