SOCIAL REACTIONS TO SEXUAL ASSAULT DISCLOSURE, COPING, PERCEIVED CONTROL, AND PTSD SYMPTOMS IN SEXUAL ASSAULT VICTIMS – Sarah E. Ullman and Liana Peter-Hagene, 2014.
Reading report by Marie Lonchambon & Zéphyrine Vasseur (M2)
When a woman is sexually assaulted, different psychological mechanisms are involved in coping with it. Social reactions, when the abuse is disclosed, can have a significant effect on victims and their recovery, especially by the impact they may have on coping strategies. While 92% of victims confide the assault to at least one person, they may experience both positive and negative reactions. Although both types of social reactions have significant effects on the victim’s recovery, negative social reactions would have greater deleterious effects than the protective effect of positive reactions.
Negative social reactions are characterized by blaming and guilt of the victim, or by stigmatization. These responses reinforce the feelings of loss of control that victims experience during the assault and thus lead to a sense of loss of control over their recovery. These women may then be discouraged from soliciting loved ones and talking about their feelings. The search for social support as a coping strategy is then no longer invested, leading to inappropriate avoidant coping strategies. Strategies are put in place to escape feelings of anger, sadness or anxiety. However, this observation should be put into perspective with regard to victims who are able to invest more in individual strategies such as meditation, planning or cognitive restructuring and wich do not depend solely on the support of others.
Positive social reactions have a positive impact on the victim’s PTSD symptoms and their ability to believe in their recovery. These positive reactions include providing emotional support to the victim so that they can hear that what happened is not their fault. In addition, research has shown that positive social reactions increase the victim’s sense of personal efficacy and perceived control over their recovery. More appropriate coping strategies are then mobilized, which would have a positive impact on symptoms.
More broadly, sexual assault forces victims to use coping strategies to cope with the event. Many strategies are inappropriate, such as denial, substance use or social withdrawal. Others are beneficial in the short term but will, in the long term, worsen the symptoms. Here too, the impact of the strategies used is nuanced. Adapted coping strategies have a smaller influence on PTSD symptoms than unsuitable strategies. However, when a victim is able to develop appropriate coping strategies, it allows them to better express their emotions and seek social support. The victim is also better able to identify and refute maladaptive automatic cognitions such as self-accusation and to detach from them. These different elements may modulate the quality of the victim’s perceived control. Good perceived control is associated with less distress, in particular because it is associated with less social withdrawal and more cognitive restructuring. The symptoms of PTSD can thus be reduced if the victim has good perceived control over his or her recovery, which, as we saw earlier, is often influenced by the social reactions the victim faces.
L’article de Sarah E. Ullman et Liana Peter-Hagene se concentre donc sur l’impact potentiel des réactions sociales à la divulgation d’une agression sexuelle. Plus précisément, leur impact sur les symptômes du syndrome de stress post-traumatique (TSPT) post-viol à travers des stratégies d’adaptation et un contrôle perçu. The objective of this research is therefore to show that positive responses to disclosure of aggression influence perceived control and positive socially oriented coping strategies and thus, help reduce PTSD symptoms. Conversely, negative reactions would be linked to more severe symptoms through maladaptive coping strategies and poor perceived control over recovery.
A sample of 1,663 sexually assaulted women completed various questionnaires (SRQ, RAQ and COPE) to assess these three main dimensions. The researchers were able to further develop the existing data on this subject by analyzing the relationships between post-abuse social reactions, coping strategies, perceived control over recovery and PTSD symptoms. The results show that perceived control over recovery and coping strategies can be intermediaries in the effect of positive and negative social reactions on PTSD symptoms.
The results of this research show that both negative and positive social reactions are related to PTSD symptoms. However, the relationship is more important for negative social reactions. These reactions do not appear to be associated with perceived control but are positively correlated with all coping strategies. Positive reactions are related to adapted coping strategies and perceived control over recovery but are not correlated with maladaptive coping strategies. As the authors predicted, negative social reactions to sexual assault disclosure are therefore related to greater symptoms, both directly and indirectly through inappropriate coping strategies. Positive reactions are associated with greater use of positive individual and social forms of coping, and better perceived control of recovery and therefore fewer symptoms. This study therefore seems to us to bear witness to the importance of coping strategies in the understanding and management of trauma in victimology.
WORDS WE HAVE LEARNED :
- Guilt : culpabilité, culpabilisation
- Loved ones : les proches
- Worsen : aggraver, empirer
- Unsuitable : inadapté, inapproprié
- Solely : uniquement