Childhood victimization and lifetime revictimization

OBJECTIVE: To examine the fundamental hypothesis that childhood victimization leads to increased vulnerability for subsequent (re)victimization in adolescence and adulthood and, if so, whether there are differences in rates of experiencing traumas and victimizations by gender, race/ethnicity, and type of childhood abuse and/or neglect. METHODS: Using a prospective cohort design, participants are individuals with documented cases of childhood physical and sexual abuse and neglect from the years 1967 through 1971 and a matched control group. Both groups were interviewed in-person (mean age 39.5 years) in 2000-2002 using a new instrument to assess lifetime trauma and victimization history. RESULTS: Abused and neglected individuals reported a higher number of traumas and victimization experiences than controls and all types of childhood victimization (physical abuse, sexual abuse, and neglect) were associated with increased risk for lifetime revictimization. Significant group (abuse/neglect vs. control) by gender and group by race/ethnicity interactions were found. Childhood victimization increased risk for physical and sexual assault/abuse, kidnapping/stalking, and having a family friend murdered or commit suicide, but not for general traumas, witnessing trauma, or crime victimization. CONCLUSIONS: These findings provide strong support for the need for early intervention with abused and neglected children and their families to prevent subsequent exposure to traumas and victimization experiences.     

The Alleged Importance of Being Tough, Really Tough

Christina Hoff Sommers and Sally Satel, a philosopher and a psychiatrist, now both policy analysts at the American Enterprise Institute, write in their recent book One Nation Under Therapy: How the Helping Culture Is Eroding Self-Reliance that empirically unsupported psychological theories ultimately descended from the cultural upheavals of the 1960s have slowly wormed their way into the educational and social scientific mainstream. These theories, the authors argue, promote a view of the human person as someone who is ‘too fragile for this world’, and in need of ceaseless counseling and coddling from the cradle to the grave. The case the authors make for their thesis is, I argue, uneven – strong in specific cases, but weak and overwrought in many others. In the end, I argue, they misidentify the main cause of the increasing shallowness that, to a growing number of critics, is slowly infesting contemporary social science and education. A review essay on Christina Hoff Sommers and Sally Satel’s, One Nation Under Therapy: How the Helping Culture Is Eroding Self-Reliance, 2005, St. Martin’s Press, New York.     

Exploring revictimization process among Turkish women: The role of early maladaptive schemas on the link between child abuse and partner violence

The purpose of the current study is to explore the revictimization process between child abuse and neglect (CAN), and intimate partner violence (IPV) based on the schema theory perspective. For this aim, 222 married women recruited in four central cities of Turkey participated in the study. Results indicated that early negative CAN experiences increased the risk of being exposed to later IPV. Specifically, emotional abuse and sexual abuse in the childhood predicted the four subtypes of IPV, which are physical, psychological, and sexual violence, and injury, while physical abuse only associated with physical violence. To explore the mediational role of early maladaptive schemas (EMSs) on this association, first, five schema domains were tested via Parallel Multiple Mediation Model. Results indicated that only Disconnection/Rejection (D/R) schema domains mediated the association between CAN and IPV. Second, to determine the particular mediational roles of each schema, eighteen EMS were tested as mediators, and results showed that Emotional Deprivation Schema and Vulnerability to Harm or Illness Schema mediated the association between CAN and IPV. These findings provided an empirical support for the crucial roles of EMSs on the effect of revictimization process. Clinical implications were discussed.     

Invisible wounds: Corporal punishment in British schools as a form of ritual

This article examines a presumed historical association between corporal punishment and the British "ruling class," taking as data the elaborate forms of beating practiced at a well-known English fee-paying boarding school in the 1950s and here documented in detail. Analogies with other forms of ritual studied by anthropologists are considered, as well as the psychosexual dynamics of beating for both officiants and victims. The paper argues that ritual corporal punishment must be seen in retrospect as a clear case of child abuse that is both physical and sexual. Such rituals of authority, though virtually abolished in Britain, may well exist in a different form in present day residential institutions for children in some Third World countries that have borrowed from now outdated European practices.     

Extending poly-victimization theory: Differential effects of adolescents’ experiences of victimization on substance use disorder diagnoses upon treatment entry

BackgroundAlthough victimization is a known contributor to the development of substance use disorders, no research has simultaneously examined how characteristics of victimization experienced over time, such as the type of abuse, the presence of poly-victimization, closeness to perpetrator(s), life threat or fear, and negative social reactions to disclosing victimization, cluster into profiles that predict substance use disorders.ObjectiveThe aim of the current study is to assess how profiles of victimization and trauma characteristics are associated with substance use disorders and assess potential gender differences.Participants and SettingParticipants were 20,092 adolescents entering substance use treatment.MethodsWe used latent class and multi-group latent class analysis to extract classes of victimization and associated characteristics. Emergent classes were used to predicted substance use disorder status at treatment intake.ResultsFive classes were extracted: poly-victimization + high harmful trauma characteristics, sexual abuse + negative social reaction and perceived life threat, emotional abuse + trusted perpetrator, physical abuse and low all. Similar classes were found for the multi-group model. In both the overall and female-specific models, the poly-victimization + high harmful trauma characteristics class was more severe than all other classes in terms of opioid use disorder, tobacco use disorder, and dual diagnosis. Other class differences were found across gender.ConclusionsAdolescents entering treatment can be distinguished by their profiles of victimization experiences and associated characteristics, and these profiles evidence different associations with substance use disorder diagnoses. Results point to a need for more nuanced assessment of victimization experiences and gender-specific interventions.     

The role of complex posttraumatic stress symptoms in the association between exposure to traumatic events and severity of intimate partner violence

BackgroundSymptoms of both posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and disturbances in self-organization (DSO) have been suggested to play a role in the association between an individual's childhood physical abuse and neglect and his/her perpetration of IPV in adulthood; however, the two have yet to be studied in one model. Thus, we aimed to examine the interrelations among childhood exposure to violence and physical neglect, exposure to trauma across one's lifetime, ICD-11 CPTSD symptoms (i.e., PTSD and DSO), and IPV severity.MethodsParticipants were 234 men drawn randomly from a national sample of 1600 mandated men receiving treatment for domestic violence in Israel. They completed measures of potentially traumatic exposure, symptoms of CPTSD, child abuse and neglect, and IPV. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to examine possible direct and indirect effects of the study variables.ResultsResults confirmed the indirect role of CPTSD symptoms in the association between the following types of traumatic exposure – childhood exposure to violence (B = .03, β = .05, SE = .01, p = .05, CI 90% [.041, .143]), childhood exposure to physical neglect (B = .04, β = .04, SE = .02, p < .01, CI 90% [.014, .092]), and lifetime exposure to potentially traumatic events, or PTEs (B = .04, β = .09, SE = .01, p < .001, CI 90% [.006, .074]) – and the perpetration of psychological IPV as an adult. No significant results were found in relation to the perpetration of physical IPV.ConclusionsThe current cross-sectional study findings suggest a preliminary direction regarding the possible direct and indirect effects of ICD-11CPTSD on the severity of IPV psychological perpetration. The clinical implications include the need to focus on both PTSD and DSO symptoms in order to help reduce these potential risk factors for psychological IPV perpetration.     

Mapping the intersections of gender and college trauma

The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore the complex juncture of gender and experiences of trauma in college. Two research questions guided this investigation: (a) How does gender intersect with an individual’s experience(s) of trauma during college? and (b) What sociocultural contexts shape the role of gender intersecting with traumatic experiences in college? Data were collected using interviews and visual mapping/written response activities. Analysis revealed three dominant themes when gender was salient in traumatic experience, including: (a) gender norms contributing to the production of trauma; (b) gender norms restricting traumatic recovery; and (c) trauma catalyzing the interrogation of gender norms. Results of this study underscore the importance of continued attention in both research and practice to the complex ways in which systems of oppression around gender, in particular, but other identities broadly, offer both restrictions and possibilities for those navigating traumatic recovery.     

论哈罗德·品特戏剧中的创伤情结

创伤文学描述的是历史性创伤事件诸如战争等对个人潜意识的影响。品特的许多作品都隐含了他对创伤精神内涵的思考。通过对《尘归尘》的分析,发现品特戏剧人物的创伤记忆来自二战这一人类历史上最骇人听闻的历史记忆。品特从当今所有暴行中都看到了它的影子。战争创伤对品特产生的影响更多的是一种对社会和人类关系内在性的感悟,是对各种恐惧和威胁的体会和感觉。     

创伤记忆与自我救赎

尤金.奥尼尔一生的创作多来源于他生活的悲剧和创伤体验,其自传性戏剧《进入黑夜的漫长旅程》更是他对个人和家庭创伤性记忆的书写。作品中人物的创伤性经历以及他们表现出来的创伤后压力综合症的症状,可以证明《进入黑夜的漫长旅程》是一部创伤作品。奥尼尔通过对个人和家庭创伤性记忆的书写,进行自我疗救,达到了灵魂的宁静,从而完成了心灵的自我救赎。     

解读托尼·莫里森《宠儿》中的树

托尼·莫里森《宠儿》中的重要意象——树,长期以来未得到研究者们应有的重视。莫里森借助这一意象关注了非洲文化在美国这一异文化环境中的命运,使得黑人文化在奴隶制下的创伤、黑人文化的强大生命力、黑人文化对黑人子民的召唤和黑人对非洲文化的向往与回归都在树这一意象上得到了集中体现。