Trauma in children

Trauma in Children

A traumatic event is any event witnessed or experienced by a child that threatens the child’s life or bodily integrity.  Traumatic events can also involve a child witnessing something traumatic happening to their loved ones. Traumatic events are especially important to young children as they depend on the perceived safety of their caretakers for their safety. A traumatic experience can have a long-lasting effect on a child and can also develop strong emotions in a child (Cook et al., 2017). Trauma is referred to as a child witnessing or going through an intensively stressful event. Traumatic events involve a wide range of events such as sexual abuse, physical abuse, medical trauma, accidents, terrorism events, suicides and traumatic losses. Witnessing or living through any of these events can cause trauma in a child, and in most cases, children require psychological treatment to help them cope with the traumatic events.

Children and adolescents vary in the way they respond to traumatic events. Some of the changes displayed in children and adolescents after experiencing a traumatic event include the development of new fears where a child develops phobias such as closed spaces or they are scared of flying or driving depending on the kind of trauma they experienced. Young children sometimes tend to experience such problems as separation anxiety, especially if their trauma is medical or if it is a result of IPV (Everstine & Everstine, 2019). Some of the therapies that can be used to treat children who have been exposed to trauma have not been empirically studied, but some treatments could be helpful. Some of the treatments include;

Cognitive-behavioural therapy- this treatment has proved to be efficient in reducing the effects of trauma in children, especially those exposed to persistent trauma (Cook et al., 2017). This treatment reduces PTSD and other depressive symptoms.

References

Cook, A., Spinazzola, J., Ford, J., Lanktree, C., Blaustein, M., Cloitre, M., … & van der Kolk, B. (2017). Complex trauma in children and adolescents. Psychiatric annals, 35(5), 390-398.

Everstine, D. S., & Everstine, L. (2019). Sexual Trauma In Children And Adolescents: Dynamics & Treatment. Routledge.