Childhood Trauma and Dissociation in Clinical Inpatients

The complex relationship between childhood abuse, dissociation, and clinical outcome is an area of burgeoning research in relation to childhood assaults like sexual and physical abuse. Non assaultive types of maltreatment like emotional abuse, emotional neglect, and physical neglect are, however, under-studied. This study examines childhood abuse, dissociation, and distress in three chronic inpatient groups: purely drug abusing; purely schizophrenic; and schizophrenic with drug abuse. Questions addressed include whether discreet types of childhood abuse contribute differently to dissociative pathology and adult cohort; whether childhood maltreatment can be categorized as emotional vs. assaultive in relation to adult outcome; whether pathological dissociation (as opposed to normative) relates to cohort, abuse type, and adult anxiety; and whether discreet abuse types predict cohort or dissociative pathology. The results of this investigation strongly indicate that non-physical types of childhood abuse contribute to adult psychosis, and that, specifically, emotional abuse predicts dissociative pathology above all other abuse types.

Autorentext

SV Axelrod has a BA in literature and psychology from Vassar College; an MA in developmental psychology from Columbia University; and a PhD in clinical psychology from LIU.