Abstract
This study examines dissociation and posttraumatic symptomatology in a sample of maltreated preschool-age children in foster care. Analyses compared Child Behavior Checklist subscale scores for the foster care sample and a community sample, and also examined differences between maltreatment subtypes. Exposure to any type of maltreatment was associated with greater dissociation and posttraumatic symptomatology in this sample. Preschool-age children with documented sexual abuse displayed high levels of posttraumatic symptoms, whereas children with documented physical abuse tended to use dissociation as a primary coping mechanism. The finding that physically abused children had high levels of dissociation confirms previous research with preschoolers.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Achenbach, T. M. (1991). Integrative guide to the 1991 CBCL/4-18, YSR, and TRF profiles. Burlington: University of Vermont, Department of Psychology.
Administration for Children and Families. (2004). Child maltreatment annual reports: Reports from the States to the National Child Abuse and Neglect Data Systems. National statistics on child Dissociation and Posttraumatic Symptoms in Children 107 abuse and neglect. Retrieved August 25, 2006, from www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/cb/stats_research/index.htm/programs/cb/stats_research/index.htm
American Psychiatric Association. (2000). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (4th ed., text rev.). Washington, DC: Author.
Barnett, D., Manly, J. T., & Cicchetti, D. (1993). Defining child maltreatment: The interface between policy and research. In D. Cicchetti & S. Toth (Eds.), Advances in applied developmental psychology: Child abuse, child development and social policy (pp. 7–73). Norwood, NJ: Ablex.
Bernstein, E. M., & Putnam, F. W. (1986). Development, reliability, and validity of a dissociation scale. Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 174(12), 727–735.
Briere, J. (1992). Child abuse trauma: Theory and treatment of the lasting effects. Newbury Park, CA: Sage.
Briere, J., & Runtz, M. (1988). Symptomatology associated with childhood sexual victimization in an adult clinical sample. Child Abuse and Neglect, 12, 51–59.
Cholankeril, A., Freyd, J. J., Becker-Blease, K. A., Pears, K. C., & Fisher, P. A. (2006, November). Examining dissociation in maltreated preschool children. Paper presented at the International Society for the Study of Dissociation International Fall Conference, Los Angeles, CA.
Chu, J. A., & Dill, D. L. (1990). Dissociative symptoms in relation to childhood physical and sexual abuse. American Journal of Psychiatry, 147, 887–892.
Cicchetti, D., & Lynch, M. (1993). Toward an ecological/transactional model of community violence and child maltreatment: Consequences for children’s development. Psychiatry: Interpersonal and Biological Processes, 56, 96–118.
Coons, P. M. (1996). Clinical phenomenology of 25 children and adolescents with dissociative disorders. Child and Adolescent Psychiatric Clinics of North America, 5, 361–373.
Fisher, P. A., Burraston, B., & Pears, K. C. (2005). The Early Intervention Foster Care Program: Permanent placement outcomes from a randomized trial. Child Maltreatment, 10, 61–71.
Freyd, J. J. (1996). Betrayal trauma: The logic of forgetting childhood abuse. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Hornstein, N. L. (1993). Complexities of psychiatric differential diagnosis in children with dissociative symptoms and disorders. In J. S. Silberg (Ed.), The dissociative child: Diagnosis, treatment, and management (pp. 27–46). Baltimore: Sidran.
Hornstein, N. L., & Putnam, F. W. (1992). Clinical phenomenology of child and adolescent dissociative disorders. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, 31, 1077–1085.
Irwin, H. J. (1994). Proneness to dissociation and childhood traumatic events. Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 182, 456–460.
Kirby, J. S., Chu, J. A., & Dill, D. L. (1993). Correlates of dissociative symptomatology in patients with physical and sexual abuse histories. Comprehensive Psychiatry, 34, 258–263.
Kisiel, C. L., & Lyons, J. S. (2001). Dissociation as a mediator of psychopathology among sexually abused children and adolescents. American Journal of Psychiatry, 158, 1034–1039.
Liotti, G. (1999). Disorganization of attachment as a model for understanding dissociative psychopathology. In J. Solomon & C. George (Eds.), Attachment disorganization (pp. 291–317). New York: Guilford Press.
Macfie, J., Cicchetti, D., & Toth, S. (2001a). The development of dissociation in maltreated preschool children. Development and Psychopathology, 13, 233–254.
Macfie, J., Cicchetti, D., & Toth, S. (2001b). Dissociation in maltreated versus nonmaltreated preschoolers. Child Abuse and Neglect, 25, 1253–1267.
Malinosky-Rummel, R. R., & Hoier, T. S. (1991). Validating measures of dissociation in sexually abused and nonabused children. Behavioral Assessment, 13, 341–357.
Muthén, L. K., & Muthén, B. O. (2004). Mplus: The comprehensive modeling program for applied researchers. User’s guide (3rd ed.). Los Angeles: Authors.
Ogawa, J. R., Sroufe, L. A., Weinfeld, N. S., Carlson, E. A., & Egeland, B. (1997). Development and the fragmented self: Longitudinal study of dissociative symptomatology in a nonclinical sample. Development and Psychopathology, 9, 855–879.
Pears, K. C., Kim, H. K., & Fisher, P. A. (2006, May). Multiple facets of maltreatment as predictors of outcomes for preschoolers: A latent class analysis approach. Paper presented at the Society for Prevention Research, San Antonio, TX.
Pfefferbaum, B. (1997). Posstraumatic stress disorder in children: A review of the past 10 years. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, 36(11), 1503–1511.
Putnam, F. W. (1997). Dissociation in children and adolescents. New York: Guilford Press.
Putnam, F. W., Helmers, K., & Trickett, P. K. (1993). Development, reliability, and validity of a child dissociation scale. Child Abuse & Neglect, 17(6), 731–741.
Sanders, B., & Giolas, M. H. (1991). Dissociation and childhood trauma in psychologically disturbed adolescents. American Journal of Psychiatry, 148, 50–54.
Sim, L., Friedrich, W. N., Hobart Davies, W., Trentham, B., Lengua, L., & Pithers, W. (2005). The Child Behavior Checklist as an indicator of posttraumatic stress disorder and dissociation in normative, psychiatric, and sexually abused children. Journal of Traumatic Stress, 18, 697–705.
Terr, L. (1991). Childhood traumas: An outline and overview. American Journal of Psychiatry, 148, 10–19.
Waldinger, R. J., Swett, C., Frank, A., & Miller, K. (1994). Levels of dissociation and histories of reported abuse among women outpatients. Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 182, 625–630.
Widom, C. S. (1999). Posttraumatic stress disorder in abused and neglected children grown up. American Journal of Psychiatry, 156, 1223–1229.
Zlotnick, C., Shea, M. T., Pearlstein, T., Begin, A., Simpson, E., & Costello, E. (1996). Differences in dissociative experiences between survivors of childhood incest and survivors of assault in adulthood. Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 184, 52–54.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Hulette, A.C., Freyd, J.J., Pears, K.C. et al. Dissociation and Posttraumatic Symptoms in Maltreated Preschool Children. Journ Child Adol Trauma 1, 93–108 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1080/19361520802083980
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/19361520802083980