NCJ Number
216362
Journal
Journal of Child Sexual Abuse Volume: 15 Issue: 3 Dated: 2006 Pages: 1-17
Date Published
2006
Length
17 pages
Annotation
Seventy women in Canada who had experienced childhood sexual abuse and were being treated in community-based private (n=25) or clinic outpatient settings (n=45) were studied in order to determine any relationships among trauma variables, complex posttraumatic stress disorder (complex PTSD), problems in regulating feelings, dissociation, physical health problems, and alexithymia (deficits in the identification, communication, cognitive processing, and elaboration of feelings).
Abstract
Findings show that the clinic sample continued to experience current forms of suffering, risk, and vulnerability associated with their childhood sexual trauma. Compared with the community sample, the clinic sample met diagnostic criteria for both lifetime and current complex PTSD and showed correlations between current problems in the regulation of feelings, dissociation, and physical health problems related to alexithymia. They also had higher levels of alexithymia. The authors discuss possible implications of these findings regarding types of treatment available in community-based private settings compared with clinic settings. The women were administered the Toronto Alexithymia Scale-20, which measures difficulty in identifying feelings, difficulty in describing feelings, and externally oriented thinking. They were also administered the Structured Interview for Disorders of Extreme Stress, which identifies current and/or lifetime complex PTSD. The women completed the Traumatic Antecedents Questionnaire in order to measure 11 domains of experience, including safety, neglect, separation/loss, family secrets, emotional abuse, physical abuse, sexual abuse, witnessing violence, and family and/or participant alcohol and drug use. 2 tables and 37 references