Self-reports of trauma and dissociation: An examination of context effects

To examine context effects in moderating the link between self-reported trauma and dissociation in undergraduate samples, we administered these measures either in the same or different experimental contexts. Trauma History Screen/THS (Carlson et al., 2011)-Dissociative Experiences Scale/DES-II (Bernstein & Putnam, 1986) correlations revealed a context effect (greater correlations in same test context), although multiple regression analyses did not confirm this finding. A context effect was supported in DES-Taxon scores using multiple regression for the THS but not the Modified Posttraumatic Stress Scale (MPSS-SR; Falsetti, Resnick, Resick, & Kilpatrick, 1993), an effect confirmed with correlation comparisons. Ethnicity influenced the association between measures of trauma and dissociation. Overall, the relation between measures of trauma and dissociation was small to medium, although high correlations were observed between the DES depersonalization/derealization subscale and the Multiscale Dissociation Inventory (Briere, Weathers, & Runtz, 2005) depersonalization and derealization subscales, supporting the construct validity of these measures.     

Seeing in the Dark: A View into Dissociation and Healing

In this paper, I will explore the role of art-making, the experience of trauma and dissociation, and the process of working with self-states from an analytic and creative frame. Relevant literature on dissociation, trauma, and the use of art will be discussed. A case involving my work with an adolescent girl who had experienced sexual abuse from a family member will be shared, with an emphasis on the meaningful role images played during the therapeutic process. Both Jungian and psychoanalytic models of conceptualizing and working with dissociation are included, following Donald Kalsched’s (2013) recommendation for a “binocular stance” to treatment, including both a focus on the inner, intrapsychic world and the interpersonal, relational realm, and how art images both illuminated and expressed these realms. Within the therapeutic process, art images allowed the therapist a view into the client’s unconscious process, and created a meeting ground for dissociative barriers to be gradually seen, felt and known, by both therapist and client. The experience of dissociation, in images and in session, provided a reference point for myself and my client, Taylor, to develop a shared understanding and a framework for growth.     

Collective Trauma,Implicit Memories,the Body,and Active Imagination in Jungian Analysis1

This presentation attempts to show the healing potential underlying the inclusion of the patient's body in the analytic process, while honouring and revisiting the understanding of the psyche-body connection described by Jung in his early work. In addition, the author offers reflections on the impact of collective trauma whose aftermath, among others, has been the disappearance of thousands of people, consequently breaking the family genealogy, leaving hundreds of children stripped of their roots and true identity. Referencing clinical material, the author describes how the process of translation and integration—from the sensory-perceptual to the conceptual-symbolic—can be halted on account of collective trauma occurring at an early stage in development. Moreover, it is shown how the potential of the archetype or image schema, linked to the somatic-affective early experiences encoded as implicit memories, can be recovered, when Embodied Active Imagination is included in the analytic work. The patient's bodily gestures and somatic experience may bridge the gap between the preverbal-implicit knowledge and the emergence of emotions and images that allow for the creation of a new symbolic narrative.     

Contagious trauma: Reframing the spatial mobility of trauma within advocacy work

Scholars have theorized that advocates who listen to the experiences of traumatized individuals suffer from ‘vicarious trauma,’ where they become affected by the process of working with trauma sufferers. Yet I argue that trauma is contagious, rather than vicarious: contagious trauma spreads, compounding and binding together sometimes unrelated life traumas. This paper focuses on the spread of contagious trauma within advocates who work together with people affected by two sets of policies that compound trauma in Australia's Northern Territory, Aboriginal Australians affected by the 2007 Northern Territory Emergency Response Legislation and asylum seekers affected by Australia's policies of mandatory detention. Using ethnographic data from participant observation and interviews with advocates as well as autoethnographic excerpts from field notes, I argue that advocates experience contagious trauma as the effects of witnessing trauma combine toxically with their own life traumas. Contagious trauma expands the destructive effects of traumatic public policy, and simultaneously shrinks the capacity of advocacy that contests these policies. Capacity shrinks as advocates construct barriers to keep trauma at bay.     

COVID-19, precarity and loneliness

In this paper I discuss Jungian psychological work of the trauma and loss experienced in reaction to COVID-19 with a man who represents a clinical composite. The issues of precarity, a concept used by the philosopher Judith Butler, are combined with the notions of lack and absence of French psychoanalyst André Green. The psychological and societal situation of precarity aroused the man’s childhood issues that were long repressed. The loneliness, isolation and death from COVID-19 mirrored his personal and the collective responses to the disaster from this global pandemic. He felt on the edge of collapse as what he knew of his world crashed and he found himself unable to cope. The subsequent Jungian work taking place through the virtual computer screen was taxing and restorative simultaneously for both analyst and analysand.     

Adverse caregiving in early life: The trauma and deprivation distinction in young children

Knowledge and understanding about the impact of cumulative adverse experiences on the health and wellbeing of children, adolescents, and adults has rapidly expanded over the past 30 years. Despite the invaluable attention and support this proliferation has drawn to the importance of early childhood experiences, we believe that it is time to move beyond broad indices of risk and toward more specific and individualized understanding of how risk exposures are linked to clinical outcomes in young children. Within infant and early childhood mental health, there is a need for greater specificity in linking adverse caregiving experiences in early life to psychopathology in children. We highlight a framework distinguishing experiences of trauma from experiences of deprivation and use the examples of posttraumatic stress disorder and reactive attachment disorder to demonstrate how greater specificity in our understanding of early adverse caregiving can lead to more accurate and targeted diagnosis and treatment for young children. Both researchers and clinicians benefit from an approach to gain a greater appreciation of the links between specific types of experiences and outcomes in the children that we serve.     

Processing trauma in psychoanalysis in ‘real’ time and in dreams: the convergence of past,present and future during COVID-19

In the current collective unrest, we and our analysands are living in real time and need vantage points from which to make meaning, as subjective experience of time is collapsing. For many analysands, the past is being relived in the present, with no imaginable future. During the time of COVID-19, dreams are providing a valuable mechanism in working with atemporal emotional trauma, previously uncontextualized. Dream metaphor can provide a transitional space to move around in within the analytic framework. This paper explores a variety of dreams from individual analysands demonstrating different ways of conceptualizing personal and collective experience, bridging between the past, present, and future. Parallels between feeling states related to the current condition and unprocessed implicit memories from the past will be examined, as a vehicle for processing past trauma. Dreams expressing current states of dread for an unimaginable future, as well compensatory dreams showing a hopeful vision of the future will be considered.     

Intersections of personal vs. collective trauma during the COVID-19 pandemic: the hijacking of the human imagination

This paper explores how the deadly shadow of COVID-19 passing over the Earth constitutes a collective trauma that frequently opens up or ‘triggers’ un-remembered personal trauma, and it provides clinical examples of these intersections. The paper further explores how the human imagination, which we normally utilize to make meaning out of traumatic experience, can be hijacked by fear – leading to avoidance of suffering and to illusory formulations and alternative realities such as conspiracy theories. Alternatively, the imagination can be employed in more realistic and creative ways – leading through conscious suffering to healing and wholeness. Which path the imagination takes is shown to depend on the capacity of individuals to feel the full reality of the human condition in general and the exquisite vulnerability of our existence as fragile human beings at this moment in history. Ernest Becker’s analysis of our ‘denial of death’ and his urgency to embrace our common human vulnerability is explored in relation to Jung’s early tendency to deny the body. The author proposes that the more creative uses of the imagination, connected to a more humble and realistic apprehension of our common destiny, may be seen in the ‘Black Lives Matter’ movement that swept the world in the aftermath of the COVID-19 outbreak.     

Sexual activity while driving: A content analysis of media reports

Sexual activity while driving fits the definition of distracted driving because it involves the diversion of attention away from the driving task. However, this risky driving behaviour has received little attention compared to other distracted driving activities. To address the lack of research on sexual activity while driving, the internet was searched from April to June 2020 for media reports in which sexual activities occurred within the cabin of a moving vehicle, taking specific note of: gender, the presence of others, time of day, use of substances, the nature of the circumstances surrounding the incident, and whether crashes had occurred. A total of 106 unique and verified cases were identified from 2004 to 2020. The reports involved 76 male (71.7%) and 30 female drivers (28.3%), and there were 43 (40.5%) serious incidents that involved a crash and 23 fatalities (21.7%). In 17 (16.0%) incidents their vehicle hit another car, and a pedestrian or cyclist was hit in 3 (2.8%) incidents. The risk of a serious incident was higher during oral sex or intercourse than solitary activities (i.e. masturbation). A total of 63 (59.5%) mild incidents (without crashes or fatalities) were identified, in which reports included accounts by witnesses or police regarding sexual activity while driving. Given the potential seriousness of incidents, this topic deserves further research to better understand the prevalence and safety implications of sexual activity while driving.     

Hyperarousal and dissociation: a study of novice skydivers

Peritraumatic dissociation describes alterations in awareness that occur during or immediately after a trauma. This study investigated a simulated form of peritraumatic dissociation by indexing the responses of skydivers (N=100) who were participating in their first skydive. Prior to jumping, participants completed the Beck anxiety inventory, the Tellegen absorption scale, and ratings of predictability and uncontrollability. Immediately after the jump, they completed the peritraumatic dissociative experiences questionnaire and the physical reactions scale. Responses indicated that the skydive elicited extreme anxiety, hyperarousal, and peritraumatic dissociation in a significant proportion of skydivers. Multiple regression analyses indicated that hyperarousal, and to a lesser extent anxiety, were strongly predictive of peritraumatic dissociative reactions. These results are discussed in terms of proposals that peritraumatic dissociation is mediated by hyperarousal.