A Study about the Effects of Type of Threat and Gender on the Development of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder

There is a standing debate about whether the A-criterion, which entails a list of physically threatening events that could cause PTSD, is accurately filtering the people who are at risk of having PTSD. Some research found clear differences in symptoms between people who experienced physical and emotional threats, however other research found no differences. This raises the question whether the A-criterion should be altered to include more emotional threats. Additionally, gender seems to have an effect on PTSD symptom development, as women experience more sexual assault, which is a large risk factor for developing PTSD. To determine whether women who have experienced sexual assault should be considered a vulnerable group, an online experiment was performed using a populationbased sample. Participants were randomly assigned to one of two conditions: physical threat or emotional threat, from which they chose an event that corresponds with a chosen arousing memory. After that,...Show moreThere is a standing debate about whether the A-criterion, which entails a list of physically threatening events that could cause PTSD, is accurately filtering the people who are at risk of having PTSD. Some research found clear differences in symptoms between people who experienced physical and emotional threats, however other research found no differences. This raises the question whether the A-criterion should be altered to include more emotional threats. Additionally, gender seems to have an effect on PTSD symptom development, as women experience more sexual assault, which is a large risk factor for developing PTSD. To determine whether women who have experienced sexual assault should be considered a vulnerable group, an online experiment was performed using a populationbased sample. Participants were randomly assigned to one of two conditions: physical threat or emotional threat, from which they chose an event that corresponds with a chosen arousing memory. After that, participants were asked some demographical information, which included a gender question. The PCL-5 was administered, to measure total PTSD symptoms. Our findings show no significant effects of event type or gender on PCL-5 scores. We conclude that there is no difference in PTSD symptom scores between the physical and emotional threat groups, and between men and women. These findings contribute to broaden the understanding of which threatening events could potentially cause PTSD symptoms and should be included in the A-criterion, and raises the question as to whether the gender differences in PTSD are as extensive as previous research found in clinical samples.Show less

Leiden University Student Repository

Documents

In Collections

A Study about the Effects of Type of Threat and Gender on the Development of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder