Childhood Trauma

The underlying primary purposes of Terr's (1990) book are to: a) comprehensively describe the nature of experience children go through when exposed to strong trauma; and b) discuss treatment of childhood trauma. The importance of understanding the nature of childhood trauma to counseling theory is highlighted by the fact that, as Terr points out, this is a very under-researched area. This means the existing body of knowledge does not provide a good foundation for theory development---and without a meaningful theoretical model, treatment is made more difficult.

The basic contribution to counseling theory of Terr's book on childhood trauma and its consequences is that she provides a much needed model of the psychoemotional and behavioral consequences associated with single episode childhood trauma. Her model is built on a psychoanalytic framework in which strong anxiety is said to often lead to suppression and repression---both strong elements of Terr's basic model. The model is built using a sample consisting of children who were kidnapped and buried in their school bus in Chowchella, California in 1976---children who, for the most pa

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Category: Psychology - C