Shaffer Anne, Yates Tuppett M, Egeland Byron R
Department of Psychology, University of Georgia, Athens, GA 30602, USA.
Child Abuse Negl. 2009 Jan;33(1):36-44. doi: 10.1016/j.chiabu.2008.12.005. Epub 2009 Jan 22.
This investigation examined developmental pathways between childhood emotional maltreatment and adaptational outcomes in early adolescence. This study utilized a developmental psychopathology perspective in adopting a multidimensional approach to the assessment of different forms of emotional maltreatment and later adjustment outcomes. Specifically, emotional abuse (i.e., verbal criticism, hostility) and emotional neglect (i.e., psychological unavailability) were compared using a process-level analytic approach to examine if and how different forms of emotional maltreatment would contribute to adolescent adjustment via aggression and social withdrawal in middle childhood.
The current study sample is drawn from a longitudinal, prospective study of a high-risk community sample (N=196), incorporating a multi-method and multi-informant design. Multiple mediator models were tested via bootstrapping regression techniques.
Bivariate correlations revealed that both emotional neglect and emotional abuse were associated with increased aggression and social withdrawal in middle childhood, and lower ratings of socioemotional competence in early adolescence. However, the mediational model, which controlled for child gender and concurrent physical and sexual maltreatment, was only significant for the contribution of emotional abuse to lower adolescent competence via social withdrawal in middle childhood. Post hoc analyses revealed that this association was only significant for boys.
While social withdrawal in middle childhood significantly explained the observed relation between emotional abuse and decreased competence in adolescence, this process did not emerge as salient in understanding the relation between emotional neglect and adolescent adaptation. Furthermore, these developmental processes appeared to vary by gender. The results are in need of replication and extension to other outcome domains, but represent an important contribution to the empirical study of specific forms of emotional maltreatment.
Emotional maltreatment is generally overlooked and unrecognized as compared to physical or sexual forms of maltreatment. This study adds to the accumulating empirical evidence that the effects of emotional maltreatment are disabling, enduring, and should be carefully assessed by clinicians. Furthermore, this assessment should specify the particular form of emotional maltreatment that has occurred, as the results of the study indicate that developmental processes and adjustment outcomes may vary according the type of emotional maltreatment (i.e., emotional abuse, emotional neglect) that is experienced. Finally, clinicians must recognize that a single maltreatment type may vary in its impact on subsequent adjustment, as significant gender differences emerged in the current study that point to the role of individual differences that warrant further investigation.
本调查研究了童年期情感虐待与青春期早期适应结果之间的发展路径。本研究采用发展心理病理学视角，采用多维度方法评估不同形式的情感虐待及后期的适应结果。具体而言，使用过程层面的分析方法比较情感虐待（即言语批评、敌意）和情感忽视（即心理上的无法获得），以检验不同形式的情感虐待是否以及如何通过童年中期的攻击行为和社交退缩对青少年适应产生影响。
本研究样本来自对一个高危社区样本（N = 196）的纵向前瞻性研究，采用多方法和多 informant 设计。通过自抽样回归技术测试多个中介模型。
双变量相关性显示，情感忽视和情感虐待均与童年中期攻击行为增加和社交退缩有关，且与青春期早期社会情感能力评分较低有关。然而，在控制了儿童性别以及同时发生的身体虐待和性虐待的中介模型中，仅情感虐待通过童年中期的社交退缩对青少年能力降低的影响显著。事后分析表明，这种关联仅在男孩中显著。
虽然童年中期的社交退缩显著解释了情感虐待与青春期能力下降之间的观察到的关系，但在理解情感忽视与青少年适应之间的关系时，这一过程并不突出。此外，这些发展过程似乎因性别而异。这些结果需要在其他结果领域进行重复和扩展，但对特定形式情感虐待的实证研究具有重要贡献。
与身体虐待或性虐待相比，情感虐待通常被忽视和未被认识到。本研究增加了越来越多的实证证据，表明情感虐待的影响具有致残性、持久性，临床医生应仔细评估。此外，这种评估应明确发生的情感虐待的具体形式，因为研究结果表明，发展过程和适应结果可能因所经历的情感虐待类型（即情感虐待、情感忽视）而异。最后，临床医生必须认识到，单一虐待类型对后续适应的影响可能不同，因为本研究中出现了显著的性别差异，这表明个体差异的作用值得进一步研究。
