The article describes the development and psychometric evaluation of the Trauma-Related Guilt Inventory {TRGI). An initial questionnaire was constructed from multiple sources of information. Three factor analytic studies were conducted to refine the TRGI and determine its factor structure, which consists of a Distress factor and three cognitive factors, Hindsight-Bias/Responsibility, Wrongdoing, and Lack of Justification. The TRGI has high internal consistency and adequate temporal stability. In validity studies with Vietnam veterans and battered women, TRGI scales and subscales were significantly correlated with other measures of guilt and with measures of posttraumatic stress disorder, depression, and other indexes of adjustment. Findings support the conceptualization of trauma-related guilt as a multidimensional construct and highlight the role of cognitions in the experience of guilt and posttrauma psychopathology.Survivors of traumatic events often experience guilt' that relates to the trauma in some way. Trauma-related guilt has been identified as a frequent symptom among survivors of childhood sexual abuse (e.g., Spaccarelli, 1994): rape victims (e.g., Resick & Schnicke, 1993); battered women (e.g., Cascardi & O'Leary, 1992); victims of serious accidents and burns (e.g., Janoff-Bulman & Wortman, 1977); combat veterans (e.g., Kubany, 1994); survivors of technological disasters (e.g., Miles & Demi,
The relationship between depression and body-image satisfaction in different ethnic groups was investigated by comparing depressed and nondepressed males and females from Caucasian-American, Chinese-American, and Japanese-American college samples. It was hypothesized that depressed respondents would manifest significantly higher levels of body-image dissatisfaction than nondepressed respondents, regardless of ethnicity and gender. The results supported the hypothesis. As a function of the depression condition, however, there are numerous ethnic and gender differences with regard to dissatisfaction with specific body parts (e.g., increased "facial" and "physique" dissatisfaction for depressed Chinese-American females). Depression, it seems, exacerbates levels of existing body-image dissatisfaction for some groups, introduces new areas of body-image dissatisfaction for others, and does not alter the image for yet others. It was further noted that research in this area could help improve our understanding about the etiology and expression of depression.
Patients with minor psychiatric disorders, including neuroses, situational adjustment reaction or acute emotional reaction, were investigated using symptom questionnaires at five research sites in Asia including: Chiang-Mai, Thailand; Bali, Indonesia; Kao-Hsiung, Taiwan, China; Shanghai, China; and Tokyo, Japan. The results revealed that the symptom profiles differ significantly among groups of different settings indicating that sociocultural background does contribute to the manifestation of neurotic symptomatology. It was also found that numerous and various subtypes of somatic scales were identified through factor analysis of symptoms for these Asian populations. It demonstrates that the spectrum of neurotic symptoms has a different focus for subjects in different sociocultural settings.
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