Ch 10 BWS, RTS, PTSD

Question 1

Mental disorder

Answer 1

A syndrome characterized by clinically significant disturbance in an individual’s cognition, emotional regulation, or behavior that reflects a dysfunction in the psychological, biological, or developmental processes underlying mental functioning.

Question 2

Battered women syndrome

Answer 2

Behaviors of women who have been physically abused by their husbands or partners and subsequently injure or kill their abusers

Question 3

Rape trauma syndrome

Answer 3

Describes how women respond to the trauma of sexual assault

Question 4

Three phase cycle of abuse

Answer 4

1) tension building
2) acute battering
3) contrition

Question 5

Lenore Walker

Answer 5

Author of 1979 book, The Battered Woman

First proposed BWS and three phase cycle of abuse.

Question 6

1st phase of cycle of abuse

Answer 6

Increased tension, anger, blaming, and arguing.

Question 7

Second phase of cycle of abuse

Answer 7

Acute battering

Battering hitting, slapping, kicking, choking, use of objects or weapons. Sexual abuse. Verbal threats and abuse

Question 8

Third face of cycle of abuse

Answer 8

Contrition
Calm stage (the stage may decrease over time). Partner may deny violence, say he or she was drunk, say he or she is sorry and promise it will never happen again.

Question 9

Learned helplessness

Answer 9

Overtime women who endure long term abuse may become resigned to their suffering and fail to resist or leave their abuser, even when they may be able to do so.

Question 10

What was Walker’s clarification of learned helplessness?

Answer 10

The intended meaning of learned helplessness was “having lost the ability to predict that what you do will make a particular outcome occur”.

Question 11

What are the traits of battered women?

Answer 11

traditional sex-role attitudes (such as the belief that women should be submissive to their husbands), poor self image, and a tendency to accept responsibility for the abuse

Question 12

What are the symptoms of the battered women syndrome?

Answer 12

Intrusive recollections of the trauma events
Hyper arousal and high levels of anxiety
Avoidance behavior and emotional numbing
Disrupted interpersonal relationships from the batters power and control measures
Body image distortion and/or somatic or physical complaints
Sexual intimacy issues

Question 13

Hypervigilance

Answer 13

Heighten attentiveness to the abusers subtle behaviors.

Question 14

What are the characteristics of batters?

Answer 14

Extremely jealous and fearful of abandonment

Question 15

What are three types of batterers?

Answer 15

Borderline personality disorder
And
Generally Violent antisocial batterer (GVA)
Relationship/family only (FO) batterer

Question 16

Characteristics of borderline personality disorder?

Answer 16

Unstable relationships, dramatic mood swings, manipulativeness, intense fear of abandonment, impulsive outbursts.

Question 17

What fraction of batters are borderline personality disorder?

Answer 17

One fourth

Question 18

What are the characteristics of a generally violent antisocial batterer?

Answer 18

Left selectively violent, predisposed to violent behavior toward people around him, antisocial, prone to impulsive behavior, dependent on alcohol or other drugs, often engages in denial

Question 19

What type of battereror has the highest rate of recidivism?

Answer 19

Generally violent antisocial batterer.

Question 20

What type of the batterer is the most common?

Answer 20

Relationship/family only (FO)better. About 50% of batterers are this type.

Question 21

What are the characteristics of a relationship/family only (FO) batterer?

Answer 21

Limited marital violence, almost no violence outside the family, lack of a personality disorder, relatively low rates of alcohol/drug abuse and depression.

Question 22

Syndrome

Answer 22

Patterns of behaviors or traits that tend to describe groups of similar people. Describes clusters of related symptoms that lead to significant dysfunction in the performance of normal activities.