Underlying Causes of Post-traumatic Stress Disorder - Essay Example

Underlying Causes of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder by Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder is a serious mental condition which is a resultof exposure to a single event or repeating traumatic situations such as, for example, exposure to a death, serious injury, sexual violence, threat of death. Such events are not typical to normal flow of a human life (Grohol, 2014). In such threatening situations people usually feel horror and hopelessness. However, those people whose occupation presupposes emotional traumas, such as soldiers, firefighters, doctors, and who are trained to perceive them as normal turn out to be less susceptive to stressor-related and trauma-related disorders (Grant & Black, 2014). Usually PTSD is perceived as a disorder triggered by a single powerful event, however it may be caused by long exposure to traumatic experience such as family abuse, living in severe poverty, witnessing crimes and abuse on a daily basis. Receiving a trauma and suffering from the symptoms of PTSD is highly subjective- it is impossible to forecast what exactly will cause cognitive, psychological, and physical overwhelming of the person (PTSD Description, 2001). People of different age and sex may become the victims of this disorder. Men usually suffer from emotional traumas received after combat experience while women most often experience PTSD after sexual violence. The appearance of symptoms cannot be predicted - patients may suffer from disorder manifestations not long after traumatic experience or the manifestations can be delayed in time (Black & Grant, 2014). In stressful periods PTSD symptoms may also become more serious and acute. Among the significant symptoms and reasons of PTSD APA distinguishes exposure to serious traumatic event, such as death, serious injury or sexual violence or witnessing death, injury of a close person as a leading criterion. Nevertheless, if someone finds out that the close person died from natural reasons or becomes a witness of such a death it cannot be considered as a symptom. In order to distinguish PTSD from other mental disorders it is important to take into account the following symptoms. Involuntary recalling of the traumatic scenes, experiencing flashbacks or having recurrent dreams about the destructive events is one of most common manifestations of PTSD. Patients are to tend to start responding to their memories and losing touch with reality. In serious cases it may cause hallucinations (PTSD Description, 2001). These recollections and dreams are intrusive and uncontrollable, and their intensity is often depends on the seriousness of the disorder. The objects, sounds, places reminding of a traumatic experience trigger the process of flashbacks (Black & Grant, 2014). Emotional problems, such as self-destructive and suicidal behavior, aggression outbreaks; sleeping problems are also considered as the symptoms of PTSD. Moreover, certain emotional detachment is often observed on PTSD patients. As people with PTSD have problems with trusting people (especially those who experienced physical or sexual assault) they are tend to detach from close emotional connection with other people (PTSD Description, 2001). As a consequence of intrusive memories people with PTSD avoid their recollections and sometimes deny their traumatic experience at all. Avoidance makes the patients work hard to forget about traumatic experience. Moreover, patients may have amnesia connected to the destructive experience. Recurrent mood switches of the patients can go from self-accusation and guilt to emotional withdrawal and emptiness (Grohol, 2014). Patients can behave aggressively in physical or verbal way towards others. According to Brewin, Andrews and Valentine, there are certain risk factors and resilience factors in probability of PTSD development. Risk factors may cause higher likelihood of getting PTSD. They include prior experiencing of dangerous events and traumas, suffering from mental disorders, witnessing injuries or getting injuries or death, lacking social support after experiencing the trauma, having additional stressful event such as changing the job or place of living, having divorce (2000). Resilient factors add to the probability of not having PTSD after traumatic event. They include looking for social or professional psychological support, discussing the trauma with support group, feeling satisfied with one`s actions after the event, elaborating the strategy that will help to cope with consequences of trauma, feeling capacity to act despite of fear (Brewin, Andrews, & Valentine, 2000). There is no direct links which can suggest why some people are more vulnerable and suffer from PTSD while others have natural emotional resources to cope with trauma without depression, avoidance, and other possible symptoms. There are two major reasons of PTSD development according to Foa and Rothbaum (1998). First, traumatic experience contravenes previous perception of the world as a safe place. Secondly, the person may feel that the world is dangerous and the one is helpless as a result of activation of prior cognition. As not all the people experience PTSD after common traumatic events, such as participation in military operations, it is possible to conclude that catastrophic thinking and maladaptive appraisal of the world lead to PTSD. However there is no strict correlation between these phenomena (Bryant and Guthrie, 2005). According to the experiment conducted by Bryant and Guthrie, firefighters were assessed on stress vulnerability and the significance of maladaptive appraisal and catastrophic thinking to PTSD development. According to the results of the research “the extent to which firefighters predicted maladaptive appraisal about themselves could serve as a predicting factor of PTSD”. In other words, the way the people see their roles in the traumatic event and its consequences influences significantly the possibility of posttraumatic syndrome symptoms appearance. This finding proves that feeling of shame can serve as a primary indicator of PTSD development in patients. Perception of the following to traumatic event state of mind as madness is also a predictor of PTSD (Bryant & Guthrie, 2005). It is capturing that it is the image of self rather than the image of the world was the predictor of PTSD, thus, people with maladaptive appraisal of personal self-competence in traumatic situations were more likely to suffer from the symptoms of PTSD. Moreover, general perception of the world as a threatening place prior to the traumatic experience adds to the likelihood of actual symptoms of PTSD arousal (Bryant & Guthrie, 2005). According to Bryant and Guthrie, “an individual`s appraisal of the traumatic events and capacity to respond to the experience” is crucial in how a person survives through traumatic events (2005). This point of view suggests that disastrous perception of oneself, surrounding, and people cause distorted perception of threat and negative outcomes in the future. It was also estimated that people who have catastrophic perception of themselves after traumatic experience have negative feelings towards the world and are prone to progress in their thinking. Thus, acute stress disorder can lead to PTSD (Dunmore, Clark, & Ehlers, 1999). According to Beck and Sloan, treatment of stressor and trauma-related disorders should be directed on helping the patient gaining control over overwhelming emotions. Counseling can have a form of personal meetings or group discussions of traumatic experience. It depends on the complexity of the case, patients with PTSD are reluctant to bring their experience to attention. It is important to build trustful relationships with the patient, as people suffering from such disorders are prone to remain detached and sensitive to traumatic experience (2012). The clinician should guarantee safety, attention, and deep concern. When treating children or adolescents, it is important to invite parents or primary caregivers as they give necessary support for the child and are valuable in proving information. It is necessary to respect already existing relationships between a child and a caregiver. Counseling must help the patient to elaborate certain defensive mechanisms against intrusive memories and emotions. Moreover, it is important to seek for personal combination of psychotherapy and medication prescriptions. To conclude it is important to say that PTSD is a mental disorder which a person can get after experiencing of traumatic event. Experiencing or witnessing injuries or death, taking part in military actions, being sexually or physically assaulted can cause PTSD symptoms development. There is no accurate answer on why some people cope with traumatic experience while others suffer from recurrent flashbacks, emotional breakdown and detachment, aggression and avoidance. Present studies suggest that certain risk factors, such as lack of support, previous negative experience, dealing with additional stress may add to the likelihood of PTSD. Moreover, there is correlation between maladaptive appraisal of self and the probability of PTSD in some people. References Grohol, J. (2014). DSM-5 Changes: PTSD, Trauma & Stress-Related Disorders. Psych Central Professional. Retrieved from: http://pro.psychcentral.com/dsm-5-changes-ptsd-trauma-stress-related-disorders/004406.html Black, D. & Grant, J. (2014). DSM-5 Guidebook: The Essential Companion to the Diagnostic and Statistical manual of mental disorders. Fifth Edition. Arlington: American Psychiatric Publishing. Brewin, C., Valentine, J., & Andrews, B. (2000). Meta-analysis of risk factors for post-traumatic stress disorder in trauma exposed adults, Journal of Consulting Clinical Psychology, 68(5), 748-766. Bryan, R. & Guthrie, R. (2005) Maladaptive appraisal as the risk factor of posttraumatic stress. Psychological Science, 16, (10), 749-752. Foa, E. & Rotham, B. (1998). Treating the trauma of rape: Cognitive –behavioral therapy for PTSD. New York: Guilford. Diagnostic Criteria for Mental Disorders. Mental Disorders. Retrieved from: http://behavenet.com PTSD. Description of the Disability.(2001).Handbook of Disorders. Retrieved from: http://dps.missouri.edu/resources/Handbook/ptsd.pdf Read More