| Description |
Recent neurobiological, epidemiological, and psychological research has provided evidence for a dissociative subtype of PTSD. However, much of the current evidence base has only included samples of adults with acute trauma exposure, and the literature has not yet determined if there are systematic differences between individuals who do and do not meet criteria for the dissociative subtype. Therefore, additional research is needed to determine whether the dissociative subtype is valid in youth with chronic trauma exposure and what factors affect the likelihood of dissociative subtype membership in youth. Using a sample of 248 adolescents (90 girls, 158 boys) between the ages of 13 to 19, this study sought to confirm the dissociative subtype of PTSD in a sample of traumatized adolescents and to investigate whether peritraumatic dissociation, emotion dysregulation, gender, and betrayal trauma exposure affected the likelihood of dissociative subtype membership. Results indicated that approximately half of participants (50.8%) met criteria for the dissociative subtype. Furthermore, results of logistic regression indicated that adolescents with greater levels of peritraumatic dissociation and emotion dysregulation were at an increased risk of subtype membership. This study has important implications concerning those adolescents who may be particularly likely to receive the dissociative subtype label. |
