Unburdened by false humility, postmodern trauma activists claim to have understood for the first time what drives all of human suffering
Trauma DispatchTrauma news you can't get anywhere else. |
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Trauma DispatchTrauma news you can't get anywhere else. |
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CATEGORY: SCHOOLS Kendra Gage, executive director, Hulitan Family & Community Services Society Source: Parksville Qualicum Beach News Read time: 1.9 minutes This Happened In September 2024, a non-profit organization in Canada opened an indigenous-specific trauma-informed daycare center. Who Did This? Hulitan Family & Community Services Society is a non-profit based in Victoria, British Columbia. Their mission is to help Indigenous families heal from the damage of colonization and develop resilience through culturally-rooted programs. Services include counseling and supports to reunite children with families, and prevent children from being placed in out-of-home care. Their website opens with a land acknowledgment. At least half of their $2.2 million (Canadian) budget (approximately $1.6 million U.S.) is funded by the Canadian government. The executive director, Kendra Gage, has been with the non-profit for over twenty years. The Premise Their annual report described the daycare services as having spaces for 24 infant-toddlers and 24 three-to-five-year-old children, providing space for parent workshops, and “…the centre, classrooms, toys, books, and outdoor spaces will be reflective of Indigenous cultures so that children and their families can see themselves reflected in the environment around them, supporting a sense of belonging.” A local news report described the specific trauma-informed practices as:
Analysis The ‘trauma’ these children experienced differs from the psychiatric definition of trauma used for defining and researching post-traumatic stress reactions which is that events must involve life-threat. Rather, it is assumed that any indigenous child has experienced ‘trauma’ by nature of being indigenous through historical trauma or perceived discrimination in current society.
There is no clear and consistent definition of what counts as trauma-informed practice, so, the definition can be almost whatever each program wants, such as asserting that wood furniture and sea foam color have healing properties. Reviews of trauma-informed practices have demonstrated there are no high-quality studies and no evidence that they work (see here). Why Is This Happening? This is one of dozens, and perhaps hundreds, of projects branding themselves as trauma-informed in the past decade. The label ‘trauma-informed’ provides an imprimatur of scientific authenticity but it has no evidence-based meaning. The leaders of these projects do not seem to care about research evidence. The purpose is to leverage the concept that trauma has been miraculously discovered as the cause of all disadvantaged groups in society. This daycare represents another example of how so-called trauma-informed practices are manifesting in support services, architecture design, education, medicine, addiction, and courts.
Their concept of trauma is baffling and the meaning of trauma-informed practices is vague. These attempts to control language are purposeful attempts to install a false intellectual framework (see here); the more confusing they are, the more complex it seems, the harder it is to grasp, but it gives the impression there must be some basis of truth to their premise. CATEGORY: POPULAR CULTURE Patrick Teahan, LICSW, Childhood Trauma Therapist YouTuber Source: NBC Today Read time: 2.1 minutes plus 30-second video This Happened In a TikTok video in August 2024, social worker Patrick Teahan asserted that there is a definitive sign of childhood trauma. Who Did This? Patrick Teahan, LICSW, is a clinical social worker who developed a large social media following by focusing on childhood trauma. His claim to expertise is based partly on his own childhood during which he endured a narcissistic parent “trauma.” His YouTube channel has dozens of videos, nearly all on childhood trauma, and 763,000 subscribers. His personal website offers a monthly subscription of $69.99 which provides twice per month Zoom calls for group Q&A sessions, access to his library of pre-recorded “E-courses,” weekly journaling prompts by email, and the opportunity to connect with other subscribers in an online “Monthly Healing Community.” Teahan was the center of a mild controversy in July 2024 when clinicians criticized his tendency to recommend clients cut off all contact with difficult parents, what he calls “going no-contact” (see here and here) The Claim The TikTok video was a brief clip from a longer conversation during an episode on The Dr. Ramani Network, a podcast run by psychologist Ramani Durvasula, a specialist in narcissism. Durvasula: What do you consider to be the definitive sign of childhood trauma? Teahan: I think for a lot of us it’s about trying to get the difficult person to be good to us in our adult lives. Durvasula: (Interrupting) Wait! Say that again! Say that again. That’s so important. Say that again. Teahan: A definitive sign of childhood trauma is about trying to get a difficult person to be good to us. Durvasula: So, that’s it, right? I mean that right there. If we stop the show right here, you just gave us wisdom for the ages, right? When the video garnered over 4.8 million views and nearly 500,000 likes, a health reporter for NBC’s Today show declared, “Teahan's answer was a mic-drop moment for many.” When the reporter interviewed Teahan, he explained that individuals who grew up with difficult parents become so interpersonally warped that their “inner child” is trying to please difficult people in the present just as they tried to please their parents in childhood. Analysis Teahan is among a large group of clinicians who believe that almost any type of everyday stressor qualifies as “trauma.” This contrasts with the definition used in posttraumatic stress disorder in which traumas are life-threatening events. According to Teahan, narcissistic mothers who are self-absorbed and criticize their children are a form of trauma and childhood maltreatment. His overly expansive use of trauma is consistent with the Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) narrative which also conflates stress with trauma. There is no such thing as a definitive sign of any childhood event. The claim is logically and scientifically hollow. Many people try to please difficult people and experienced neither true childhood trauma nor narcissistic parents. Also, many people have suffered childhood trauma or narcissistic parents, and do not have trouble dealing with difficult people. Teahan’s methods of reaching his audience include videos of him playing guitar and drums, singing, dancing, role playing as narcissistic parents, and dressing up as the famous painter Bob Ross. If you do not share Teahan’s worldview or disagree with his teaching methods, he seems easy to dismiss. Below is a clip from one of his videos showing his many talents: But simply dismissing him would miss the context that he is obviously popular. A substantial portion of the population shares his worldview and desires his unique way of blaming parents for their adult relational problems. Why Did This Happen? Teahan is among a growing group of clinicians who are trying to make their living as internet experts. They do not provide therapy. Instead, they use their clinical expertise to coach, enlighten, and entertain. The attractiveness of the TikTok video seems partly due to the underlying ideology of the claim. By asserting childhood trauma can make permanent changes to one’s personal relationship style, it assumes that humans are highly fragile. This is the same ideology of other false claims that have great appeal to a segment of the population including the bestseller book The Body Keeps the Score (see here), the contrived complex PTSD disorder, and the ACE movement (see here). These are all provably wrong but that is not a concern for some individuals whose personal worldviews are seamless with these fabricated worlds. CATEGORY: GOVERNMENT PROJECTS Jasmine B. MacDonald, Ph.D. Source: Australian Institute of Family Studies Read time: 2.0 minutes This Happened In August 2024, an Australian government agency issued a “practice guide” for researchers on how to conduct trauma-informed research. Who Did This? The first author on the report was psychologist Jasmine MacDonald, a Research Fellow in the Australian Institute of Family Studies (AIFS). She has six first-author and five secondary-author research papers. Her first-author papers include literature reviews on depression and post-traumatic stress purportedly caused by the mental stress of being a journalist. She has conducted one study involving original data collection of trauma reactions (an online questionnaire of TV camera operators). Her four co-authors on the report have conducted zero studies on trauma reactions. The AIFS is an Australian Government agency. Its mission is “to conduct high-quality, impartial research into the wellbeing of Australian families” that can influence government policy and services for families.
Most of the recommendations are already part of common sense IRB guidelines on how to obtain informed consent and respect participants’ privacy. But many recommendations were novel. The five sections used to organize the report and some of the more unique recommendations follow: 1. Planning and design Consider how your research can be strengthened by “anti-oppressive” and “decolonising” frameworks. 2. Participant screening and recruitment When recruiting a victim of trauma, the individual must be called “victim-survivor,” not “victim.” 3. Data collection When collecting data, “use a location that is familiar.” If participants would rather interact with their clinician rather than a research assistant, that should be accommodated. Let participants choose where they sit. Make sure recording devices are positioned so they do not “reinforce power imbalance.” Encourage participants to bring support persons during the research. Avoid “asking ‘why’ questions as these may be perceived as judgmental.” “Start with the least sensitive questions and gradually move to questions about sensitive content.” 4. Analysis and dissemination “Consider applying an intersectional lens to the data.” 5. Project team self care As a researcher, “Reflect on your own traumatic experiences” throughout the research project and have a self-care strategy in place to keep you “grounded and calm.” Analysis The authors added a not-so-small caveat on the final page: “To date, there is a lack of evaluation of the impact of trauma-informed strategies on outcomes for participants in research and evaluation projects. We do not yet know if these approaches are achieving their intended goal and purpose of minimising negative impacts on participants or whether there are any unintended outcomes.” In other words, there are no data to show these recommendations are effective for any outcome and may instead by harmful (see similar conclusions here). The authors provided assurance, however, that they were experts because “The literature informing this practice guide was mostly based on the experiential learnings that authors have had while conducting their own case study or research/evaluation projects.” They neglected to mention that none of the authors have experience interacting with a live human research participant who has experienced trauma. This guide is the nightmare for most clinical researchers. If university IRB committees adopted these practice guides, standardized or efficient research would not be feasible on any clinical population. CATEGORY: CONTROL OF LANGUAGE AND IDEAS Robert H. Pietrzak, PhD Source: Journal of Psychiatric Research Read time: 2.5 minutes This Happened In March 2024, a study was published using an eight-factor model of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms. Previously, seven had been the highest number of factors considered to be the best model. In contrast, for more than three decades, PTSD had been diagnosed as just three clusters of symptoms. Who Did This? Psychologist Robert H. Pietrzak was the senior author on the study. He is a professor of Psychiatry and of Public Health at Yale University, and works at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, National Center for PTSD. He has over 400 research publications, including at least twelve using factor analysis of PTSD symptoms. The Premise In this study, researchers collected data from 3,847 veterans on the twenty symptoms in the PTSD diagnostic criteria [1]. They created eight groupings of those symptoms to replicate an 8-factor model that recently had been created by the same research group [2]. Researchers found that three of the eight factors correlated with depression, four of the eight factors correlated with anxiety, and four of the eight factors correlated with suicidal ideation. The authors concluded that these findings demonstrated validity of the 8-factor model. They suggested that this model may lead to better assessment, treatment, and prevention of PTSD. The details of this study are summarized very briefly here because they are inconsequential. As the analysis below reveals, this study is emblematic of a larger problem in trauma research. Analysis This study is one of approximately six hundred studies over the past four decades using the results of a statistical technique to discover or confirm factors of PTSD. The statistical technique is usually some variation of factor analysis. Briefly, factor analysis works by calculating how frequently each symptom is present with every other symptom. The mathematics then reduces a large number of items into a handful of factors by grouping items that tend to co-occur with each other into a factor, and separating those that co-occur relatively less frequently into other factors. The premise of factor analysis is that there exists a latent model of a construct that cannot be directly measured. This type of premise is unprovable with current technology. Whether the latent model exists is a theoretical question. Why is this important? When criteria for psychiatric disorders were revised for the 2013 publication of DSM-5, a tragic decision was made that has gone barely noticed. The old three cluster algorithm of symptoms used to make a diagnosis was thrown out and replaced by a four-cluster algorithm. The sole reason for this momentous change was because many factor analysis studies had shown four factors was the best mathematical solution. For the first time in history, factor analysis research was used to change diagnostic criteria. There have been at least seven important reviews of the massive factor analysis of PTSD literature. In the most recent review, I analyzed 206 studies on different metrics of whether factor analysis is a useful technique for designing diagnostic criteria [3]. There were too many interesting findings to summarize here, so, I’ll mention only two highlights. 1. In sixty-six confirmatory factor analysis studies with adults using DSM-5 criteria, researchers found twelve different best-fitting models that ranged from one to seven factors. A four-factor model was best-fitting most often, however, that was in only 59% of studies. With this variety of outcomes, factor analysis is closer to stamp collecting than a valid method of discovering human nature. 2. Results were contingent on which models researchers opted to study. Whenever four-factor models were tested against models with more than four factors (five, six, or seven factors), the four-factor model was best fitting in only 12.8%! Because factor analysis tries to find the model that accounts for the most mathematical variance, the model with a higher number of factors is almost always the best fitting. That is probably why the new 8-factor model was best-fitting in its inaugural test. When someone creates a 9-factor model, that will be best-fitting. So, how many underlying factors really exist in a model of PTSD? Schmitt and colleagues probably have the answer. They conducted perhaps the most rigorous factor analysis possible, trying to avoid methodology pitfalls that have snared less careful researchers [4]. They concluded overall the “results provide greater evidence for a one-factor model.” References [1] Stiltner B, Fischer IC, Duek O, Polimanti R, Harpaz-Rotem I, Pietrzak RH (2024). Functional correlates of a novel 8-factor model of PTSD in U.S. military veterans: Results from the National Health and Resilience in Veterans Study, Journal of Psychiatric Research 171:69-74. DOI: 10.1016/j.jpsychires.2024.01.017. [2] Gross GM, Spiller TR, Duek O, Pietrzak RH, Harpaz-Rotem I (2023). Clinical significance of novel 8-factor model of DSM-5 PTSD in national VA PTSD residential treatment data: Internally- v. externally-cued intrusions, Journal of Affective Disorders, 328:255-260. DOI: 10.1016/j.jad.2023.02.046. [3] Scheeringa MS (2024). Is factor analysis useful for revising diagnostic criteria for PTSD? A systematic review of five issues ten years after DSM-5. Journal of Psychiatric Research 176:98-107. DOI: 10.1016/j.jpsychires.2024.05.057. [4] Schmitt T A, Sass DA, Chappelle W, Thompson W (2018). Selecting the "best" factor structure and moving measurement validation forward: An illustration. Journal of Personality Assessment, 100(4), 345-362. DOI: 10.1080/00223891.2018.1449116. CATEGORY: GOVERNMENT PROJECTS Source: NCTSN Read time: 2.1 minutes This Happened On September 6, 2024, the National Child Traumatic Stress Network (NCTSN) newsletter announced a new webpage reiterating their support of trauma-informed pediatric psychiatry. Who Did This? The NCTSN was founded in 2000 and has been continuously funded by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Administration. Funding supports two sites—UCLA and Duke University—that co-direct a network of hundreds of sites that have been supported to create and disseminate knowledge about assessment and treatment of trauma in children and adolescents. The Premise The new webpage outlined the premise and guiding principles of trauma-informed care, and included links to other resources on its website. The premise is that trauma causes such a wide range of problems for victims that the only type of credible care requires consideration of biological, psychological, social, and cultural factors. Most importantly, these considerations must extend across all of society where trauma victims make points of contact for services. Humanitarian ethics demand this special treatment because thoughtless healthcare practices, such as careless comments at the check-in desk or judgmental attitudes in the office, can retrigger victims and compound their suffering [1]. The six principles of trauma-informed care, as defined by SAMHSA, are [2]: Safety Trustworthiness and Transparency Peer Support Collaboration Empowerment Cultural and Historical Awareness Analysis There are numerous major concerns that have been expressed about trauma-informed care. Lack of evidence. A recent review of trauma-informed care implementations could locate only six studies of decent quality, and none were randomized [1]. The review concluded: “We found limited, mixed, and conflicting evidence for the effects (or perceived effects) of trauma-informed organisational change interventions…” Another recent review that was written to critique the premature embrace by the Scottish government for establishing trauma-informed care in national policy also found a lack of evidence [3]. Conceptual. Nearly a decade after appearing on the scene out of the blue, the concept is still vague. People are still not sure what it is [3]. Control of Language and Ideas. The vagueness of the concept seems on purpose. Trauma-informed care is not simply treatment by a doctor or therapist who understands how to treat psychological trauma, although proponents place their umbrella over such care (imagine how impish it would seem to extend this type of language to surgeons who operate on broken bones as skeleton-informed care). The broad and vague conceptualization makes sense when understanding that trauma-informed care is a movement, not a science-based intervention. Trainers who provide workshops on trauma-informed care are careful to emphasize that becoming trauma-informed is a transformation process (see here). The long-term aim is to change the culture for professionals to think and talk about trauma victims as highly fragile humans. Misrepresentation of science. According to proponents of trauma-informed care, the situation is urgent because trauma causes permanent biological damage to victims’ brains and bodies. Despite this being a common belief among trauma experts, this belief has been repeatedly debunked (see here, here, and here). Unintended consequences. Framing of suffering in a way that humans are highly fragile has the possible unintended consequences of creating false beliefs of how people understand themselves and creates a sense of feeling less resilient than they really are [4]. Why Is This Happening? This movement is consistent with the moral foundation of progressive liberals that human nature is almost completely molded by life experiences—such that individual differences in success or failure are caused by experiences, not unchanging heritable traits—and care for the disadvantaged must supersede all other moral concerns (such as tradition, loyalty, patriotism, and liberty). The progressive sensibility yearns for a predictability that the movement of life and society can be controlled, to be able to point at one thing and say with certainty, “This is the oppression that caused all my problems.” That is a false certainty that has little prospect of truly helping individuals with deep-seated problems. References [1] Natalia V. Lewis, Angel Bierce, Gene S. Feder, John Macleod, Katrina M. Turner, Stan Zammit, Shoba Dawson, "Trauma-Informed Approaches in Primary Healthcare and Community Mental Healthcare: A Mixed Methods Systematic Review of Organisational Change Interventions", Health & Social Care in the Community, vol. 2023, Article ID 4475114, 18 pages, 2023. DOI: 10.1155/2023/4475114. [2] SAMHSA, “SAMHSA’s concept of trauma and guidance for a trauma-informed approach,” HHS Publication No. (SMA) 14-4884. Rockville, MD: Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, 2014. [3] Mark Smith, Sebastian Monteux, and Claire Cameron (2021). Trauma: An ideology in search of evidence and its implications for the social in social welfare. Scottish Affairs 30(4):472–492 DOI: 10.3366/scot.2021.0385. [4] Mark Smith and Sebastian Monteux (March 2023). Trauma-informed approaches: A critical overview of what they offer to social work and social care. Insights: A Series of Evidence Summaries. The Institute for Research and Innovation in Social Services. CATEGORY: GOVERNMENT PROJECTS Vice Admiral Vivek H. Murthy, MD, MBA Source: Office of the Surgeon General Read time: 2.3 minutes This Happened In August 2024, the U.S. Surgeon General issued an advisory to draw immediate national attention to the mental health problems of parents. Who Did This? Vivek H. Murthy has served as the U.S. Surgeon General since 2021 when appointed by President Biden. He previously served in the same post 2013-2017 when appointed by President Obama. His medical training is in internal medicine. He has one research publication from 2004 when he was in training. The Claim This advisory (about 13 pages of text) asserted that mental health problems of parents in the U.S. are extreme, and worse, those are being passed down to their children. There is a long list of causes of mental stress that parents have always had to deal with, e.g., lack of sleep, finances, and worrying about children’s health. But now there are causes that previous generations did not have to consider—social media, influencers, the youth mental health crisis, and an epidemic of loneliness—such that “success and fulfillment feel increasingly out of reach.” Reversing this situation will take a combination of new government policies and programs plus culture change. He listed 34 action steps divided among government, employers, community organizations, and other groups. Analysis It is hard to reconcile Murthy’s assessment that parents are highly stressed with the fact that until the twentieth century parents have had to deal with far worse stress such as higher mortality for women during childbirth, higher death rates of children from diseases, unsafe working conditions, poverty, and uncertain food supply. Going even farther back in time they had to deal with basic survival issues, predators, frequent tribal warfare, and overall, much shorter life spans. The only evidence Murthy cited that things are bad was that “41% of parents say that most days they are so stressed they cannot function and 48% say that most days their stress is completely overwhelming.” These data did not come from a research study. They came from a survey by Harris Polls. Murthy never provided evidence, or even asserted, that parental mental health is worse now than in the past. The premise of an advisory is supposed to be that a new health problem has risen which requires national attention, but Murthy never made such a case. His evidence that children are at high risk because of parental mental health problems was based almost entirely on the research on adverse childhood experiences (ACEs). The ACE literature is, however, flawed, because it has been 100% cross-sectional and has nearly zero power to determine causal relations (debunked here). Many of the 34 recommendations were simplistic platitudes that are not in dispute, such as sleep well, eat right, and “Connect with parents and caregivers in your life...” The quality of the report was low in terms of scientific rigor. It reads more like an undergraduate thesis than national policy guidance based on scientific consensus. No research was discussed in detail. Why Did This Happen? Murthy appears intent on being the Coddler in Chief of the nation’s mental health. A central premise was his unconventional claim that parents are vulnerable because they feel unappreciated by society. For example, “Many parents and caregivers feel undervalued for prioritizing parenting over employment...” Hence, many of his recommendations were for government, businesses, and communities to remunerate parents in various ways. This claim was contrary to most individuals’ experiences because the value of being a parent has never been contingent on recognition from society. A truism of parenthood is that the love and special bond involved in raising children is the greatest joy in life. This advisory follows a string of reports by Murthy with a similar theme that the U.S. population has reached an unprecedented stage of fragility, suffering from a wide range of new emotional and behavioral problems. His previous Surgeon General reports have included youth mental health, suicide prevention, youth violence, and loneliness. He seems to perceive the population as capable of being emotionally wounded by everyday stressors. This is consistent with a larger shift in the U.S. during the past decade driven by a portion of the population that implemented social emotional learning in K-12 schools, created campus cultures with safe spaces, protection from microaggressions, and fabricated moral panics over smartphones and eco-anxiety. This agenda reflects a biased intellectual framework about human nature and a utopian belief system that the role of government and society is to uplift humanity. Like Trauma Dispatch? You can subscribe here to a weekly email notice of new posts. The Body Does Not Keep the Score: How Popular Beliefs About Trauma Are Wrong (Michael Scheeringa)11/14/2024
CATEGORY: BOOK REVIEWS written by Michael S. Scheeringa Read time: 1.9 minutes I wrote The Body Does Not Keep the Score (November 2024) because no one else had published a critical analysis of the claims made by Bessel van der Kolk in The Body Keeps the Score. Given the massive popularity of van der Kolk’s book (reviewed here), and the influence it has on clinical work and social policy, it was amazing that there had been almost no critical analysis of it. It has been one of the most popular books in the world for an amazing eight years and still going strong. My aim was to review the evidence as to whether his claims were true. Book Summary The majority of the 166 pages of text methodically reviews the evidence for 122 claims made in van der Kolk’s book, including 42 claims about neurobiology, 51 claims about treatments, and 29 claims about miscellaneous topics such as child development and memory. These analyses show that van der Kolk’s claims are wrong because he either misrepresented studies, cherry-picked studies that supported only his claims, or made jargon-filled vague statements with no supporting evidence. Contrary to van der Kolk’s claims, I showed that the evidence indicates that any brain differences that exist between individuals with PTSD and those without PTSD pre-existed trauma experiences, and probably serve as vulnerability factors for developing PTSD. Also, the evidence does not support the notion that body-based treatments are superior. In fact, the evidence for his claims is thin to nonexistent. In addition, I addressed crucial topics that van der Kolk ignored. If his theory that trauma damages the brain is correct, what is the mechanism for causing damage? There is a massive amount of research on cortisol and epigenetics that he barely touched. The research on these topics has been unreplicable and far from convincing, which I addressed in a chapter on mechanisms. Also, if his theory that trauma damages the brain is not true, then what explains the research that shows brain differences in individuals with PTSD? He never considers the diathesis stress theory, which is far better supported than any other theory, which I addressed in a chapter on alternative theory. The book includes 265 references for those who wish to consult original sources of the evidence.
My 2021 paper reviewed twenty-five pretrauma prospective studies showing that it is highly unlikely that trauma damages brains [1]. I am also the founder of Trauma Dispatch newsletter. Beyond Neurobiology and Treatment Claims The popularity of van der Volk’s book seems to be due far more to interest in van der Kolk’s neurobiological theory that “the body keeps the score” than to the claims about bodily-based treatments. My conclusions about this neurobiology theory run counter to the consensus in the field among researchers. How could I arrive at such different conclusions? This wrong consensus cannot be simply an honest mistake among very smart people. I addressed this in a chapter on ideology. The premise of van der Kolk’s theory is an ideology that genetics and heredity play no role in creating fixed behavioral traits in humans. His theory depends on human nature being highly malleable, which is appealing to many other aspects of a leftist progressive agenda that have proven extremely popular with a large portion of the population. In this sense, it seems that the popularity of van der Kolk’s book is also about him as a person. The stories of his fighting with psychiatric orthodoxy throughout his career make up a large part of his book. My analyses of this aspect, coupled with his ideological premises, show that The Body Keeps The Score has been popular not because it was about fact-based science, but because it was promoting a certain belief system. REFERENCES 1. Scheeringa MS (2021) Reexamination of diathesis stress and neurotoxic stress theories: A qualitative review of pre-trauma neurobiology in relation to posttraumatic stress symptoms. International Journal of Methods in Psychiatric Research 30:e1864. doi: 10.1002/mpr.1864 Like Trauma Dispatch? You can subscribe here to a weekly email notice of new posts. CATEGORY: SCHOOLS Cover of the 70-page CorruptED report Source: Parents Defending Education Read time: 1.7 minutes This Happened On August 28, 2024, a report was issued that reviewed syllabi of college courses for future teachers across the nation which exposed the radical ideologies being taught. Who Did This? Parents Defending Education produced the report. The organization website describes itself as “a national grassroots organization working to reclaim our schools from activists promoting harmful agendas.” The Premise The report, CorruptED: Colleges of Education and the Teacher As Activist Pipeline, examined 110 syllabi and 53 course descriptions from over 50 universities and colleges. The purpose was to document guiding principles being taught to the next generation of teachers which included radical left-wing ideologies. Organized by state, university or college, and course title, the report was narrative in style, listing specific phrases of course content. Oft-repeated topics included:
Analysis What is the connection to trauma? Multiple courses that taught these progressive views included trauma as another source of unequal and unfair form of oppression. Their definition of trauma, however, was from a distorted reality. Discrimination, whether real or perceived, is viewed as trauma. Because certain groups suffer discrimination as “trauma,” the remedy is implementation of trauma-informed classrooms. While the other topics of woke ideology get all the attention, many may not yet have realized how the leveraging of trauma over the past thirty years is part of the same movement. The psychiatric concept of trauma is a victim of its own success. The designation of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in 1980 and the following explosion of research to validate the disorder and develop effective treatments is one of the great success stories of psychiatry. Part of the success of PTSD research has been to show that the development of PTSD is always limited to experiences of life-threat because those are the types of sudden, unexpected, overwhelming moments of panic and fear for one’s life that causes the syndrome with true functional impairment. Experiences that do not rise to that level may be stressful and cause other problems, but they do not cause PTSD. It seems to have been inevitable that any social justice cause that sought status worthy of political action would claim their unique situation of social stress was trauma. Hence, nearly every form of perceived or real oppression is now being exaggerated as trauma in the progressive vision. Like Trauma Dispatch? You can subscribe here to a weekly email notice of new posts. CATEGORY: CONTROL OF LANGUAGE AND IDEAS James T. Allegretto, Executive Director, Youth of North Carolina Source: WHQR public media Read time: 2.2 minutes This Happened On August 22, 2024, a one-day summit was held in Wilmington, North Carolina to educate staff of youth-serving organizations about ways to minimize or cope with Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE). Who Did This? Youth of North Carolina, a non-profit organization, sponsored the summit. Their executive director, James Allegretto, joined the organization in 2022. The Premise The Youth Resilience Summit was advertised as “an exciting and informative day to discover how you can better minimize adverse childhood experiences and build resilience for our children.” The keynote speaker was retired basketball star Kenny Anderson. Speakers included the chief judge of the local court district (Independent) and the local district attorney (Democrat), referring to themselves as Batman and Robin while fighting for justice together for over 25 years. Also among the fifteen speakers was the current Democrat nominee for governor Josh Stein. Eleven presentations were offered on topics including:
The chief judge told a reporter that too many people cling to an old ‘tough-on-crime’ philosophy, whereas his aim is to identify the root causes of criminal behavior, which include adverse childhood experiences. Analysis No matter how you slice these types of events promoting ACEs, whether it’s negatively focused on the alleged harms or, like this one, positively focused on resilience, the foundational message is the same: Human minds are incredibly fragile to environmental psychological insults. The message is based on the belief that ACE research has established an incontrovertible fact that adverse experiences in childhood cause permanent harm in the forms of adult mental problems and physical illnesses. The problem is that none of it is true. Adverse childhood experiences are associated with adult illnesses, but it is because bad things tend to travel together in life due to other shared factors. Childhood experiences do not cause these catastrophic outcomes. While well-intentioned on humanitarian goals to help children, ACE programs are destined to fail. Trauma Dispatch documented some of the pushback against the ACE ideology and ACE screening here. As the negative ACE message of catastrophic harms has grown a bit stale, the movement has been shifting to focus on resilience. Both messages are counterproductive for children. The harm message teaches children that they are incredibly fragile, and the resilience message teaches them that they are not naturally resilient.
Why Is This Happening? Allegretto was quoted as saying, “It almost feels like a movement, right? But the reality is that we discovered how adverse childhood experiences impact people two decades ago, and we're just now getting on board and making a difference.” The movement is based on the moral foundation of progressive liberals that care for the disadvantaged trumps other moral concerns and that human nature is almost completely molded by life experiences. Events like this promoting ACEs have been happening for the past fifteen years around the United States every week in the form of conferences, workshops, and professional development trainings. Trauma Dispatch has documented some of their content here, here, and here. It’s an attractive ideology to believe in because researchers have used slippery language to conflate association with causation, and because it appeals to the compassionate impulse to help the disadvantaged. Like Trauma Dispatch? You can subscribe here to a weekly email notice of new posts. CATEGORY: GOVERNMENT PROJECTS Rep. Jahana Hayes (D-CT) Source: Congress.gov Read time: 2.1 minutes This Happened On August 15, 2024, the text of a bill was made public that would amend an existing law to extend federal funding for trauma-informed programming in schools for five more years. Who Did This? The bill was sponsored by Jahana Hayes (D-CT). She was a public school teacher for fifteen years. Hayes was elected to her first term in Congress in 2019. She was a cosponsor of Rep. Ocasio-Cortez’s Green New Deal in 2019 proposing a goal of 100% renewable energy; she introduced resolutions in Congress in 2020, 2023, and 2024 to declare racism a public health crisis; and she advocates for Israel to accept a cease fire deal with Hamas. The Premise HR 8981, the Supporting Trauma-Informed Education Practices Act, proposes to amend the SUPPORT for Patients and Communities Act, which was passed in 2018 to stem the opioid drug crisis. The 2018 law created a sprawling set of new regulations that includes Medicaid and Medicare insurance coverage, FDA regulation, pharmacist duties, opioid addiction supports, workforce expansion, and public health education. Funding for trauma-informed care in schools was folded into the public health section of the law on the presumption that trauma was a driving force of substance abuse. It authorized $50 million per year for five years to fund grants to local agencies to implement the following:
The funding for the trauma-informed care component was time-limited, originally authorized only for 2019 through 2023. The 2024 amendment seeks to re-authorize that for 2025 through 2029. It also adds a new mandate to provide mental health services to teachers and other school staff. Hayes introduced the same legislation in 2022 but it was not voted on. Analysis Studies show that many individuals who abuse substances have experienced childhood traumas, but these data come from cross-sectional studies that cannot determine causation. While some vulnerable individuals who experience trauma may escalate their use of substances, blaming substance abuse on trauma may be overly simplistic. Providing public education about trauma sounds innocent on face value, but as other posts showed (here and here), trauma-informed philosophy is a pandora’s box of ideology that ranges far beyond research evidence. It teaches people that they are highly vulnerable to brain damage and lifelong physical illness if they experience trauma, when the truth is that most people have no enduring symptoms following trauma. Trauma-informed trainings are focused on creating a cultural shift in how people think about human nature as nearly defenseless to oppressive experiences. The amendment mischaracterized the status of these issues by labeling the program “evidence-based” six times. Why Is This Happening? The 2018 law that created the original trauma-informed component was sponsored by a Republican representative and co-sponsored by ten Republicans and six Democrats, and it was approved by a majority of both parties. This was unusual since trauma-informed bills are typically offered by Democrats because the ideology is in harmony with the progressive leftist vision of human nature and an agenda to expand government entitlement programs. It seems likely that the national concern about the massive opioid epidemic in the United States lowered Republicans concerns about including the trauma-informed component as a relatively small part of the law. As the epidemic has dragged on, however, under a Democrat president, Republican support for the component has disappeared. The 2024 amendment is sponsored exclusively by Democrats, failed once before in 2022, and seems unlikely to pass this year. Like Trauma Dispatch? You can subscribe here to a weekly email notice of new posts. |
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