Trauma Reenactment: Rethinking Borderline Personality Disorder When Diagnosing Sexual Abuse Survivors

Trippany, Robyn L.; Helm, Heather M.; Simpson, Laura R.

doi:10.17744/mehc.28.2.ef384lm8ykfujum5

Cited by 15 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 2 publications

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“…Despite the mind blocking knowledge of the abuse from conscious awareness, the traumatic experience takes a toll. Often, these effects manifest indirectly through physical and psychological symptoms that occur without apparent cause (Beck, Elzevier, Pelger, Putter, & Voorham-van der Zalm, 2009;Ross, 2005;Courtois, 1997;Briere & Spinazzola, 2005;Kaehler & Freyd, 2009;Trippany, Helm, & Simpson, 2006). Because the individual cannot consciously connect the sequelae of betrayal traumas with a cause, betrayal has the potential to induce more complex and prolonged distress.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Experience of a Lifetime: Study Abroad, Trauma, and Institutional Betrayal

Wright

Smith

Freyd

2016

Journal of Aggression, Maltreatment & Trauma

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iii Acknowledgements I would like to thank those people who lent me their support and energy during the nearly two years of conducting this project. To my committee, Dr. Jennifer Freyd, Dr. Carly Smith, and Dr. Joseph Fracchia: I cannot express enough thanks for your continued support and encouragement. Jennifer, when I sat down in your class nearly two years ago, I did not know I was about to discover one of my great passions. Thank you for showing me it is possible to be an activist, a scholar, and a compassionate human being. Carly, thank you for being an ever-conscientious and intentional mentor.Professor Fracchia, thank you for giving me new lenses to see the world's flaws, and the hope that we will find a way to change them. You never failed to supply snacks or kind words when I needed them most. iv Table of ContentsIntroduction 1 Background 3 Purpose 11 Method 12 Participants 12Procedure 13 Measures 15 Data Preparation and Analysis 19Results 22 Discussion 30 Limitations 38 Conclusion 40Bibliography 41 actions to be supportive, and she was undoubtedly balancing the confusing, possibly conflicting, obligations to protect institution, law, and student. However, the administrator's actions left Mallory feeling it was "impossible to begin healing" until there was evidence of the program improving measures for student safety, and changing the response to incidents students experience.When Mallory wrote to the administrator to ask to discontinue contact, the administrator complied. Unfortunately, there were still further negative outcomes. The two professors who were most helpful to Mallory following the assault-who took her1 The student's true name was not released to the public. 2 The perpetrator has not been identified; it is not clear whether the assailant was a fellow student or a member of the host country. Mallory labels the mishandled response from her study abroad program as a "revictimization" that was "intrusive" during the time she should have been allowed to begin the process of recovery. Indeed, in an open letter to her college and the study abroad program, Mallory stated that changes to the emergency protocol of the school and study abroad program, would be necessary "in order to make this situation right, to allow my healing process to truly begin, and quite honestly, to sleep soundly at night" (Smyth, 2014).Research from the field of psychology suggests not only that exposure to traumatic events while studying abroad is common, but also that the way in which institutions respond has the potential to exacerbate a student's negative reaction to that event. Given the paucity of research about study-abroad programs, the present study aims to explore both the prevalence of students' exposure to traumatic events during study abroad, and the effects of the institutional culture and actions on the after-effects of traumatic events experienced during study abroad.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Experience of a Lifetime: Study Abroad, Trauma, and Institutional Betrayal

Wright

Smith

Freyd

2016

Journal of Aggression, Maltreatment & Trauma

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“…Higher incidences of physical complaints such as irritable bowel syndrome, chronic pelvic pain, and musculoskeletal pain have been documented in individuals with a history of interpersonal abuse (Beck, Elzevier, Pelger, Putter, & Voorham-van der Zalm, 2009;Ross, 2005), including those maintaining little or no memory of documented abuse (Courtois, 1997). The effects of this abuse are seen psychologically as dissociation, anxiety, depression (Briere & Spinazzola, 2005), and interpersonal difficulties that are sometimes extreme enough to fit a diagnosis of borderline personality disorder (Kaehler & Freyd, 2009;Trippany, Helm, & Simpson, 2006). Even if memory of abuse is largely intact, these memories are often of a disjointed and "unshareable" nature, which leads to difficulty seeking satisfying psychological help (van der Kolk & Fisler, 1995).…”

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confidence: 99%

Dangerous Safe Havens: Institutional Betrayal Exacerbates Sexual Trauma

Smith¹,

Freyd

2013

Journal of Traumatic Stress

336

396

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Research has documented the profound negative impact of betrayal within experiences of interpersonal trauma such as sexual assault (Freyd, 1994, 1996; Freyd, DePrince, & Gleaves, 2007). In the current study of college women (N = 345, 79% Caucasian; mean age = 19.69 years, SD = 2.55), we examined whether institutional failure to prevent sexual assault or respond supportively when it occurs may similarly exacerbate posttraumatic symptomatology-what we call "institutional betrayal." Almost half (47%) of the women reported at least one coercive sexual experience and another 21% reported no coercion, but at least one unwanted sexual experience (total reporting unwanted sexual experiences, N = 233). Institutional betrayal (e.g., creating an environment where these experiences seemed more likely, making it difficult to report these experiences) was reported across different unwanted sexual experiences (47% and 45% of women reporting coercion and no coercion, respectively). Those women who reported institutional betrayal surrounding their unwanted sexual experience reported increased levels of anxiety (R(2) = .10), trauma-specific sexual symptoms (R(2) = .17), dissociation (R(2) = .11), and problematic sexual functioning (R(2) = .12). These results suggest that institutions have the power to cause additional harm to assault survivors.

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“…A chart-review study found a prevalence of past sexual abuse of 50% among inpatient adolescents with BPD (Westen, Ludolph, Misle, Ruffins, & Block, 1990). Given these findings, some have speculated that BPD represents complex PTSD, suggesting that past trauma drives the ED characteristic of BPD (Cloitre, Garvert, Weiss, Carlson, & Bryant, 2014; Ford & Courtois, 2014; Trippany, Helm, & Simpson, 2006; van der Kolk, Pelcovitz, Roth, & Mandel, 1996). Other researchers have suggested that past abuse or trauma are neither necessary nor sufficient for a BPD diagnosis (Zanarini et al, 1997).…”

Section: The Development Of Ed In Bpdmentioning

confidence: 99%

Borderline personality disorder and emotion dysregulation

Chapman

2019

Dev Psychopathol

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Borderline personality disorder (BPD) is a severe and complex disorder characterized by instability across many life domains, including interpersonal relations, behavior, and emotions. A core feature and contributor to BPD, emotion dysegulation (ED), consists of deficits in the ability to regulate emotions in a manner that allows the individual to pursue important goals or behave effectively in various contexts. Biosocial developmental models of BPD have emphasized a transaction of environmental conditions (e.g., invalidating environments and adverse childhood experiences) with key genetically linked vulnerabilities (e.g., impulsivity and emotional vulnerability) in the development of ED and BPD. Emerging evidence has begun to highlight the complex, heterotypic pathways to the development of BPD, with key heritable vulnerability factors possibly interacting with aspects of the rearing environment to produce worsening ED and an adolescent trajectory consisting of self-damaging behaviors and eventual BPD. Adults with BPD have shown evidence of a variety of cognitive, physiological, and behavioral characteristics of ED. As the precursors to the development of ED and BPD have become clearer, prevention and treatment efforts hold great promise for reducing the long-term suffering, functional impairment, and considerable societal costs associated with BPD.

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Trauma Reenactment: Rethinking Borderline Personality Disorder When Diagnosing Sexual Abuse Survivors

Cited by 15 publications

References 2 publications

Experience of a Lifetime: Study Abroad, Trauma, and Institutional Betrayal

Experience of a Lifetime: Study Abroad, Trauma, and Institutional Betrayal

Dangerous Safe Havens: Institutional Betrayal Exacerbates Sexual Trauma

Borderline personality disorder and emotion dysregulation

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