Survivors Of Childhood Trauma Research Articles

A Bridge Over Troubled Waters: Spirituality and Resilience with Emerging Adult Childhood Trauma Survivors

Spiritual meaning-making influences survivor resilience. This article explores and critiques gaps in resilience research as it relates to spiritual meaning-making and childhood trauma survivor development. This work begins with a reflection on the influence of sacred text interpretations and proceeds to address contextual considerations for pastoral counseling with emerging adult childhood trauma survivors. The article concludes with a discussion of the complex relationship between spiritual coping, theological conflict, and survivor adjustment.

Meditative Dialogue: Cultivating Compassion and Empathy with Survivors of Complex Childhood Trauma

Complex childhood trauma often affects the capacities of survivors to experience empathy and compassion toward themselves and others. Recent mindfulness literature recognizes meditation as an evidence-based practice that is able to change the brain, increasing one's capacities for empathy and compassion. This article offers an exploration of selected literature on complex childhood trauma and on mindfulness practices related to the development of compassion and empathy. A case study illustrates the use of a meditative dialogue practice in psychotherapy with a survivor of complex childhood trauma that serves to increase her ability to have empathy and compassion for herself and others.

Indirect Trauma: Implications for Self-Care, Supervision, the Organization, and the Academic Institution

In this article, the nature of what is referred to in this article as indirect trauma, or the ways in which clinicians are affected by their work with survivors of childhood trauma, is examined. Based upon current research and theory, three manifestations of indirect trauma are identified and discussed: secondary traumatic stress, vicarious traumatization, and compassion fatigue. Factors that may mitigate or increase the risk of experiencing indirect trauma are then presented. The implications that indirect trauma has for self-care strategies, as well as for clinical and trainee supervision, the organization, and the academic institution are presented in light of relevant research. Case examples are employed throughout to illustrate key concepts.

Stories from the road of recovery – How adult, female survivors of childhood trauma experience ways to positive change

The aim of this study was to explore how female survivors of childhood trauma who have sought treatment experience ways to positive change. Little knowledge exists regarding the first-person perspective of the recovery process following childhood trauma, and getting access to this perspective might contribute to better understanding of these processes, hence offering opportunities for health promotion. All clients (31, including 3 who dropped out) from six stabilization groups for women exposed to human-inflicted traumas were invited to participate in the study. Experiences of the recovery process were not restricted to the period of receiving treatment, and all clients who volunteered were included in the study. Qualitative, in-depth interviews with 13 consenting clients were carried out shortly after completion of the group treatment. All interviews were transcribed verbatim, and a hermeneutical–phenomenological approach to analysis was applied. The analysis resulted in five interrelated, but distinct main themes: finding new ways to understand one's emotions and actions, moving from numbness toward vital contact, becoming an advocate of one's own needs, experiencing increased sense of agency, and staying with difficult feelings and choices. The themes support, yet supplement trauma theory, by underlining the relationship between emotional contact and meaning-making, while downplaying the necessity of symptom elimination in the experience of recovery. The findings also underline that the active role trauma survivors play in their processes of recovery.

The relationship between childhood trauma and neuropsychological functioning in first episode psychosis

There is an overlap between the neurocognitive deficits observed in adult survivors of childhood trauma and individuals with psychosis. Few studies examine the relationship between trauma and neurocognition in psychosis. The purpose of this study was to examine this in a first episode population. Thirty individuals with first episode psychosis who had completed a battery of neurocognitive testing in the longitudinal Northern Ireland First Episode Psychosis Study were subsequently interviewed and separated into two groups on the basis of childhood trauma. Between groups analysis was used to compare differences on measures of memory, executive functioning and verbal fluency. Twenty-one (70%) participants reported childhood trauma and nine (30%) reported no such history. Participants with a history of childhood trauma had a significantly higher pre-morbid IQ than the no childhood trauma group and experienced a significant decline in IQ when pre-morbid IQ estimates were compared to current IQ estimates. After controlling for pre-morbid IQ on all domains, the childhood trauma group had significantly poorer performance on tasks of semantic fluency, delayed visual recall, and visuospatial working memory. Childhood trauma may contribute to specific neurocognitive deficits and may predict a lower level of functioning relative to pre-morbid ability.

Childhood trauma and thought action fusion: A multi-method examination

Cognitive biases, such as Thought Action Fusion, play a crucial role in the cognitive-behavioral model of anxiety disorders and have been shown to prospectively increase the risk of developing future psychopathology. However, little research has examined the developmental factors that contribute to this theoretically important construct. Therefore, the current study examined how childhood trauma predicts TAF using a multi-method approach. Using both a self-report (N=407) and in vivo measure (N=107), results indicated that emotional abuse and physical neglect predicted the likelihood bias of TAF, whereas physical abuse predicted the moral bias. Our findings are conceptualized within a developmental psychopathology framework and cognitive intervention strategies for survivors of childhood trauma are suggested. Limitations and future directions are discussed.

The role of impulsivity in the association between childhood trauma and dissociative psychopathology: Mediation versus moderation

Previous studies on survivors of childhood trauma documented associations between psychological dysregulation, impulsivity, and both behavioral and emotional manifestations of distress. Yet, the mechanism that links these variables remains unclear. The current study aims to examine the pattern of relations between a history of child abuse, impulsivity and dissociation. More specifically, it examines whether impulsivity serves as a moderator or mediator in the association between childhood trauma and dissociation. Eighty-one inpatients from the acute wards of two psychiatric hospitals participated in this study. Data were collected by clinician-administered questionnaires. A highly significant linear hierarchical regression analysis revealed that both psychiatric comorbidity and childhood trauma made unique contributions to the variance of dissociation. Yet, the significant association between childhood trauma and dissociation decreased when impulsivity was entered into the regression model. Our findings suggest that impulsivity mediates the association between childhood trauma and dissociative psychopathology and imply that the identification and treatment of impulsivity could be a potentially valuable clinical target in individuals with dissociative disorders.

Morphometry of the pituitary gland and hypothalamus in long-term survivors of childhood trauma

Chronic pituitary dysfunction is increasingly recognized as a sequela of traumatic brain injury (TBI). Our aim was to rule out any late morphometric changes of the pituitary gland and hypothalamus in survivors of TBI during childhood requiring intensive care. We assessed morphometric abnormalities of the sella region and hypothalamus in patients who sustained TBI during childhood. The patients showed no clinical hormonal dysfunction at the acute phase and pituitary hormone levels at the time of our study were within normal limits. From the 18 enrolled patients in the magnetic resonance study, five were removed due to morphological changes or anatomical variations. We studied the MRI of 13 male survivors (mean age 27 years, mean time after trauma 20 years) and compared them to 13 male control subjects who were matched in terms of age (mean age, 26 years), education and ethnicity. Analyses of the pituitary gland and sella on a midsagittal T2- and T1-weighted image were performed. We used voxel-based morphometry (VBM), an unbiased MRI morphometric method to investigate hypothalamic region in this group of patients. There was only a trend towards a reduced pituitary gland width in the patient group compared to controls. However, no significant morphological and morphometric abnormality was seen and VBM showed no hypothalamic grey matter loss. In the absence of hormonal dysfunction, no persisting morphometric changes of the pituitary gland and hypothalamus were seen in survivors of childhood TBI requiring intensive care.

Review of Introduction to working with adult survivors of childhood trauma.

It is with great enthusiasm that I write this review of Carolyn Knight's new book, Introduction to Working with Adult Survivors of Childhood Trauma. Knight has done a wonderful job of writing a boo...

Women and substance use disorders.

Substance use disorders belong to the class of externalizing behaviours that are generally more common among men than women. Those women who do have substance disorders therefore deviate more from the norms of society compared with men, tend to live in an environment characterized by high risk of violence and other forms of abuse, and tend to be survivors of childhood trauma. In terms of seeking treatment, women often have difficulty acknowledging their problems with substance use disorders, and professionals are reluctant to ask women about drug or alcohol use. Even when they do seek treatment, women in many countries face practical and financial barriers to access treatment. For women who do enter treatment, outcomes are generally comparable to outcomes for men, suggesting that facilitating entry into treatment can yield substantial benefits for women with addictions.

Treatment of Depressive Symptoms in Adult Survivors of Childhood Trauma

ABSTRACT This study examined differences in depression symptoms between four Personality Disorder (PD) groups in 123 adult survivors of abuse who completed a 6-week inpatient program for Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Data were collected at admission, discharge, 3-months, and 1-year post-treatment. Participants completed self-report measures at each time point. Based on Millon Clinical Multiaxial Inventory-II scores, participants were divided into four PD groups: avoidant, borderline, dependent, and histrionic. MANOVAs and ANOVAs were calculated to examine depression symptoms over time. Depression and hopelessness symptoms decreased post-treatment, and treatment gains were maintained at 1-year. Multiple regressions were calculated to determine which PD trait was the best predictor of response to treatment for depression. High dependent PD traits were the only significant predictor of lowered depression symptoms.

Personality characteristics of adult survivors of childhood trauma

Lenore Terr (1991) proposed a framework for childhood trauma that distinguishes between single-incident trauma (Type I) and repeated or prolonged trauma (Type II). Terr's framework and data collected from the National Comorbidity Survey (NCS) are used to examine differences in personality between adult survivors of childhood Type I trauma, childhood Type II trauma, and a control group of adults not traumatized as children. Groups were compared on five personality scales. Results indicate that individuals in the trauma categories scored higher in neuroticism and openness to new experiences than individuals in the control group. The Type I group was lower than the control group on interpersonal dependency, whereas the Type II group scored higher than the control group on this measure.

Survivors of Childhood Trauma: Possible Approaches to Therapy

Survivors of Childhood Trauma: Possible Approaches to Therapy

Survivors of Childhood Trauma: Possible Approaches to Therapy

TO THE EDITOR: The clinical case conference by Andreea L. Seritan, M.D., Glen O. Gabbard, M.D., and Lloyd Benjamin, M.D., published in the Oct. 2006 issue of the Journal (1), is much appreciated. Several aspects of the case conference deserve comment. “Ms. A” is a child survivor of the Holocaust (2, 3) who was hidden with her family, not separated from them. She did not have to assume a gentile identity nor was she adopted. Furthermore, she is not a death camp survivor, one of the “living skeletons” liberated from such places as Auschwitz, Buchenwald, and Dachau. Nevertheless, the deaths of her mother and brother were incalculable losses, sustained while she lived in constant danger of being caught and killed by Nazis. She was also suspected of being sexually abused, possibly as part of the “cost” of being protected. The indelible impact of such genocidal persecution could not be ameliorated in short-term therapy, and while I do not believe any such claims were made, this point was not clearly delineated. Furthermore, there was no posttermination follow-up to determine whether the patient’s trauma was “worked through” (1, p. 1705) as opposed to “opening up more than the patient can handle”(1, p. 1708). Despite Dr. Seritan’s sensitivity, did she inadvertently get drawn into a masochistic enactment that could have re-traumatized the patient by inflicting another loss upon her? Ms. A was appropriately informed that Dr. Seritan was moving in 6 months and had reservations about the treatment. But was Dr. Seritan so impressed by the patient that she proceeded nonetheless? Perhaps the wish to write about the patient also influenced her. Nonetheless, the patient’s resilience, ego, strength, and presentation were positive factors not to be minimized. However, Ms. A’s persona and idealizing maternal transference not only recreated the long-lost mother who suddenly disappeared, but also concealed the terrified child who had to be invisible to the Nazis, invisible to her stepmother, and perhaps somewhat invisible to her lovely therapist with a European accent. In the patient’s unconscious mind, the therapist could have been a Nazi also. Dr. Seritan read about the Holocaust and consulted knowledgeable supervisors. While Dr. Gabbard correctly points out that empathic attunement is more important than factual knowledge, our research (2, 3) suggests that clinicians working with survivors of historical trauma are well-served by knowing about the actual circumstances that their patients’ endured. The reconstruction of the traumatic period and the opportunity to develop a coherent narrative—often for the first time—may be one of the important achievements in therapy. Perhaps Dr. Seritan alluded to this when she states, “I pointed out to Ms. A how much work she had done and how much she had accomplished.”

Symptom Severity, Alcohol Craving, and Age of Trauma Onset in Childhood and Adolescent Trauma Survivors with Comorbid Alcohol Dependence and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder

Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and alcohol dependence (AD) are frequently comorbid disorders. Given evidence that childhood traumas may be associated with broader, more severe psychological sequelae than later traumas, the present study examined whether the association between alcohol and trauma symptomatology is more pronounced among individuals with earlier trauma onsets in a sample of 42 childhood and adolescent trauma survivors diagnosed with comorbid AD-PTSD. As predicted, individuals reporting childhood traumas reported greater severity of trauma and alcohol symptoms and greater alcohol craving. These results suggest that individuals with childhood trauma histories may be particularly vulnerable to relapse following AD treatment.

Transforming the legacy: couple therapy with survivors of childhood trauma

Transforming the legacy: couple therapy with survivors of childhood trauma

Mothers with Mental Illness Who Are Childhood Trauma Survivors: Implications for Policy and Practice

Long-term effects of childhood victimization may be devastating, even for resilient women. Abusive relationships are characterized by feelings of betrayal and powerlessness, and violation of physical and emotional boundaries. Abuse survivors may reconstruct reality to reconcile expectations or wishes about how life should be.1,2 Women's willingness and ability to form positive, healthy relationships in the present, including relationships with children and treatment providers, may be affected by their early histories of violence and trauma. Childhood violence has been associated with the development of later psychopathology. In a recent study of patients with chronic major depression,

Reexamining Psychotherapeutic Action Through the Lens of Trauma

Work with survivors of childhood trauma sheds light on the enigmatic subject of just how psychotherapy produces change. The focus of this paper is the observation that there are two fundamental change mechanisms in psychotherapy, catharsis and internalization . Each one has a different time course and different clinical characteristics including the role played by the therapeutic relationship. Catharsis is triggered by the presence of the empathically attuned therapist, while internalization is driven by the therapist's slightly aloof stance of expectancy and the patient's need for connection. Each mechanism has a different childhood origin. Taken together, these two mechanisms are sufficient to explain therapeutic gains in other forms of psychotherapy and with other pathologies.

The Legacy of Child Sexual Abuse

The personal narrative, Cherchez la Femme, Cherchez la Femme: A Paradoxical Response to Trauma by Penelope Hollander, is a poetic and poignant account of one woman’s struggles with the psychological effects and enduring legacy of sexual abuse by her father. She writes of the spectrum of confusing and contradictory affects associated with the experience. She tells us there was a “feeling of genuine pleasure from the perpetrator . . . dad aroused great pleasure in me,” but there were also symptoms of “migraines, vomiting, nervous coughing, choking, and truant absenteeism from school”. She raises one of the enduring questions regarding the sexual molestation of children. “What does it mean to be a victim and survivor of childhood trauma?” In this short commentary, I will present my current understanding of the process, but I will introduce it with two caveats: 1) To paraphrase Tolstoy, each victim is unique in his or her own way; and 2) “It’s not so important that we understand everything clearly but that we clearly understand where the obscurities are” (Freud, 1926). We will see there are a lot of obscurities. The history of society is replete with the multiplicity of ways in which children have been traumatized (Demause, 1991). Finkelhor (1994) has commented on the universality of the sexual maltreatment of children. In a review of 19 countries, he found the rates of child sexual abuse to be generally similar around the world (Finkelhor, 1994). Sexual maltreatment of children usually takes one of three forms: 1) the sexual exploitation of children to gratify one’s own physical sexual needs; 2) the excessive erotization of children through inappropriate sexual stimulation; and, 3) the mortification, vilification, and suppression of the child’s emerging sexuality (Finkelhor, 1991). Although the rates of child sexual abuse in the United States have declined in recent years, nevertheless it is estimated that 12% to 35% of women and 4% to 9% of men have unwanted sexual experiences prior to 18 years of age (Putman, 2003). Sexual abusive behaviors refer to any sexual behavior which occurs: 1) without consent, 2) without equality, or 3) as a result of coercion. Children legally and by definition of their limited cognitive development and experiences in the world are not able to give consent. An understanding of the psychological effects of traumatic childhood sexual abuse requires an understanding of the developing child as well as the centrality of affects associated with childhood sexual abuse. While children are generally exposed to the same traumatic happenings as adults, the trauma occurs in a developing child who is in the midst of elaborating an inner representational world, sensual-sexual motivational Psychiatry 67(3) Fall 2004 217

A Search for Meaning

A Search for MeaningJoAnn ReissJoAnn Reiss1. Washington Psychoanalytic Institute.Search for more papers by this authorPublished Online:June 2005https://doi.org/10.1521/psyc.67.3.261.48988PDFPDF PLUS ShareShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail ToolsAdd to favoritesDownload CitationsTrack Citations AboutReferencesFreud, S. (1905). Fragment of an analysis of a case of hysteria. In J. Strachey (Ed. and Trans.), Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud, 7, pp. 3–122. London: Hogarth Press, 1953. Google ScholarSchafer, R. (1992). Retelling a Life. New York: Basic Books. Google Scholar Previous article Next article FiguresReferencesRelatedDetails Volume 67Issue 3Sep 2004 Information© Guilford Publications Inc.PDF download