Traumatic Stress: Effects Of Overwhelming Experience On Mind, Body And Society

Description

This volume presents the current state of research and clinical knowledge on traumatic stress and its treatment. With contributions from the leading authorities, the book summarizes the knowledge that has emerged since the acceptance of PTSD as a defined entity in 1980. It also addresses the uncertainties and controversies that confront the field of traumatic stress, including the complexity of posttraumatic adaptations and the unproven effectiveness of some approaches to prevention and treatment. 

Throughout the book, contributors demonstrate that rather than a normal response to an extraordinary situation, PTSD leads to a profound disorganization of the capacity to properly attend to subsequent stresses and to distinguish relevant from irrelevant stimuli. Highlighting the controversies and uncertainties that punctuate the study of trauma -- including issues of memory, dissociation, and the interface between culture and trauma and the inextricable relationships between biological and psychological processes--this book examines how effective treatment interventions require a firm understanding of the basic processes involved at various stages in the development of PTSD. 

Reviews

'An impressive and important book....From children to the elderly, from psychoanalysis to psychopharmacology, from the individual to society at large, the clinical material is all here.' --- Frank W. Putnam, MD 

'Like a small number of classic volumes in the field of traumatic stress...this book is remarkable for including not only (the) scientific and medical viewpoint, but also the sociopolitical context in which trauma, it study, and its treatment occur....An invaluable contribution to the field of traumatic stress studies, and psychology in general. We highly recommend this book to researchers, clinicians, students, and all of those committed to understanding and taking responsibility for the effects of trauma on the individual and society.'--- Contemporary Psychology 

'Once in a blue moon, a book is published that bears such importance for its subject that it becomes an instant classic. Traumatic Stress is such a book...No doubt, researchers will consider Traumatic Stress as an essential resource, and no academic libraary serving PTSD scholars will want to be without it...' --- Choice, December 1996 

A valuable text on trauma and its treatment. I use the book in the courses Clinical Practice I and II. It is very informative in that it provides many perspectives regarding the possible long-term effects of trauma on children and adults. In addition, the authors' styles make the book highly accessible and useful for clinicians at all levels of practice.''--Karen Kaufman, PhD, LCSW, Adjunct Faculty Member, Fordham University Graduate School of Social Service