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The Impact of Childhood Abuse Among Women With Assault‐Related PTSD Receiving Short‐Term Cognitive–Behavioral Therapy
Author(s) -
Resick Patricia A.,
Suvak Michael K.,
Wells Stephanie Y.
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
journal of traumatic stress
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.259
H-Index - 134
eISSN - 1573-6598
pISSN - 0894-9867
DOI - 10.1002/jts.21951
Subject(s) - sexual abuse , cognitive processing therapy , child abuse , psychiatry , clinical psychology , poison control , psychology , randomized controlled trial , physical abuse , injury prevention , child sexual abuse , cognitive behavioral therapy , cognition , medicine , environmental health
This study examined the effect of child sexual or physical abuse on brief cognitive–behavioral therapy treatments with adults with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). We analyzed secondary data from two randomized controlled trials (Resick, Nishith, Weaver, Astin, & Feuer, 2002; Resick et al., 2008) that included women with PTSD who did or did not have child sexual abuse (CSA) or child physical abuse (CPA) histories to determine whether childhood abuse impacted dropout rate or reduction in PTSD symptoms. In Study 1, presence, duration, or severity of CSA was not associated with dropout; however, frequency of CSA significantly predicted dropout ( OR = 1.23). A significant CPA Severity × Treatment Group interaction emerged such that CPA severity was associated with greater dropout for prolonged exposure (PE; OR = 1.45), but not cognitive processing therapy (CPT; OR = 0.90). Study 2 found no differences in dropout. Study 1, comparing CPT and PE among women who experienced at least 1 rape found no differences in outcome based on childhood abuse history ( r p 2 s = .000–.009). Study 2, a dismantling study of CPT with women seeking treatment for adult or child sexual or physical abuse found that for those with no childhood abuse, CPT‐C, the cognitive‐only version of CPT, had an advantage, whereas both forms of CPT worked best for those with higher frequency of childhood abuse; the effect size was small.