Biological Vulnerability and Traumatic Events - Essay Example

Biological Vulnerability and Traumatic Events The primates are most advanced organisms and the human species leads in this front. Ideally the fact that we are the only bipedal organisms shows that the working of our biological systems is not only different from the other organisms, but is most civilized. The psychological set up of humans is a consequence of genes and the environmental context. This means that our mannerisms, reasoning and mentality are not only determined by our genetic makeup but also by what we consume from our environment.

It is on this premise that an examination of the biological vulnerability can be related to traumatic events in abnormally behaving people (James, 2007, p. 21). Biological vulnerability could loosely refer to the state of the brain whereby it is exposed and susceptible to affective disorders like depression and posttraumatic stress disorder. A traumatic event is an occurrence either physical or psychological that leads to trauma. Trauma refers to the damage of the psyche which causes changes in the physical brain structure or more commonly the brain chemistry (Caruth, 1995, p. 211). These traumatic events usually could be categorized into two; firstly, the ones that occur only once in the lifetime of individuals.

Usually these experiences cause the brain extreme shock and confusion inevitably causing trauma which could make the brain biologically vulnerable. These events include sexual encounters like rape by stranger, domestic and external violence, grievous harm and burns to the body or harassment (Nairne, 2008, p. 21). The second and more common category of traumatic events is the repetitive events in the lifetime of their victims. These events include bullying, sexual abuse, indoctrination, poor parentage and drug abuse (Leys, 2000, p. 34). I argued before that the human system consumes what its environment avails.

The traumatic events present a harmful environment for the human system. The psychology of a sexually abused underage for example, is devoid of self esteem and instead the infant suffers from low confidence, confusion and fear. In that case, the human system would seek mitigation ways. The victim would show social withdrawal always preferring to stay alone. In addition, this victim would be too submissive and helpless. This condition is slowly ingrained into the psychology of the victim so that he/she develops affective disorder tendencies.

On losing hope, the victim might develop self rejection. At this stage the victim is biologically vulnerable and extreme cases end up in suicide (Kolk, 1987, p. 5). The environment that humans are exposed to therefore plays a fundamental role in mental development. Let us consider another situation involving poor parentage and seek to draw the relationship between poor parentage as a traumatic event and biological vulnerability. Parents who abuse drugs for instance, are generally violent, irresponsible and abusive.

These parents may repeatedly subject their children to adverse events where they are consistently beaten up, assaulted sexually and physically and even forced to abuse drugs (McDouglas, 1914). This category also includes alcoholic parents. The mentality that develops of children in these families is that of complete anarchy and sadism. The children become skeptics and cynics with no hope in life. This could lead to a state of denial. Essentially, this is a state whereby the children reject themselves and see no value in life.

At this stage the stress levels are at their peak. It is out of stress that trauma develops (Shiromani, LeDoux, & Keane, 2009, p. 34). Affective disorders like depression find their origin in these traumatic events. The victim’s perception of the world changes after the trauma. Many a times the brain is in a state of denial. The victim might want a justification for what he has undergone through. It is the failure of a plausible justification that pushes the victim to the wall. These victims consequently lose sight of wrong and good.

They lose the sense of morality and legality (Kalat, 2012, p. 209). A drug abuse victim for instance develops his own standards of what is moral and what is otherwise. At the initial stages, the victim might be able to distinguish between what is right or wrong but does not avoid the wrong. However, soon this victim loses the distinguishing ability. The despondency sets in eroding his ability to reason. A continued exposure to the harmful environment facilitates the commission of wrongs. The behavior soon graduates to abnormality (Wayne, 2010).

A good example is the inculcation into homosexuality. Initially the victim is forcefully raped and the he rues the whole ordeal. However it is reported that if the process is repeated the victim begins to tolerate before finally accepting it. In the same token, a child who is continually bullied by his elders would hate the ordeal in the initial stages (James, 2007). Usually he would be crying just by the mere sight of his tormentors. A feeling of insecurity and fear crops in. However after repeated incidences, the victim of bullying gets acclimatized to the whole concept of being harassed.

He loses his self esteem and confidence. Soon it develops into mental torture. This sets in at a time when he is biologically vulnerable. The victim could develop affective disorders such as depression as a result (Straub & Myers, 2004, p. 23). References Caruth, C. (1995). Trauma: explorations in memory (1 ed.). New York: JHU Press. James, W. (2007). The Principles of Psychology (Vol. 1). New York: Cosimo, Inc. Kalat, J. W. (2012). Biological Psychology. New York: Cengage Learning. Kolk, B. A. (1987). Psychological Trauma.

New York: American Psychiatric Pub. Leys, R. (2000). Trauma: a genealogy (Vol. 1). Chicago: University of Chicago Press. McDouglas, W. (1914). Psychology: the study of behaviour. New York: CUP Archive. Nairne, J. S. (2008). Psychology (1 ed.). New York: Cengage Learning. Shiromani, P. J., LeDoux, J. E., & Keane, T. M. (2009). Post-traumatic stress disorder: basic science and clinical practice (1 ed.). New York: Springer. Straub, R. O., & Myers, D. G. (2004). Psychology (1 ed.). New York: Worth Publishers. Wayne, W. (2010).

Psychology: Themes and Variations (1 ed.). New York: Cengage Learning.