Trauma and Stressor-Related Disorders Quiz

Trauma and Stressor-Related Disorders

• Trauma and stressor-related disorders are a group of emotional and behavioral disorders that result from traumatic and stressful experiences.
• Such experiences can include exposure to physical or emotional violence or pain, including abuse, neglect, or family conflict.
• These conditions can often present similarly to other psychiatric disorders, such as depression and anxiety.

Diagnosis and Characteristics

• A trigger event is necessary to confirm a diagnosis of trauma and stressor-related disorders.
• Patients with stress-related disorders have elevated risks of psychiatric comorbidities and less healthy lifestyles (e.g., smoking, poor diet, and lack of physical activity).
• They also tend to have multiple somatic diseases (e.g., cardiovascular disease, life-threatening infection, autoimmune disease, and neurodegenerative disease).

Definition of Trauma

• The APA defines trauma as "any disturbing experience that results in significant fear, helplessness, dissociation, confusion, or other disruptive feelings intense enough to have a long-lasting negative effect on a person's attitudes, behavior, and other aspects of functioning."
• Traumatic events can be caused by human behavior (e.g., rape, war, industrial accidents) or by nature (e.g., earthquakes).

Definition of Stressors

• The APA defines a stressor as "any event, force, or condition that results in physical or emotional stress."
• Stressors may be internal or external forces that require adjustment or coping strategies on the part of the affected individual.
• The WHO defines stress as any type of change that causes physical, emotional, or psychological strain.