Publications by authors named "Bachem R"

Background: Somatic symptoms, such as chronic pain, fatigue, and gastrointestinal disturbances, are commonly reported in individuals with a history of childhood maltreatment (CM), which includes various forms of abuse and neglect experienced before age 18. Although CM is strongly associated with somatic symptoms, the specific relationships between CM subtypes and these symptoms, as well as the mechanisms connecting them, remain insufficiently understood. This review examines the complex interaction between CM and somatic symptoms, which often coexist with mental disorders and significantly impact quality of life and healthcare systems.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • Perceived social support plays a crucial role in predicting the severity of PTSD and complex PTSD symptoms after experiencing trauma, but gender differences in responses to this support have not been extensively studied.
  • In a study involving 2,483 adults across 39 countries, it was found that females reported higher PTSD and complex PTSD symptoms compared to males, while no significant gender differences in perceived social support were observed.
  • Both male and female participants with low perceived social support experienced greater PTSD and complex PTSD symptoms, with some evidence suggesting that the relationship between perceived social support and PTSD symptoms might be stronger for males.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • This study investigates how living difficulties after migration affect the relationship between maternal trauma and children's emotional outcomes among East African mothers seeking asylum in Israel.
  • It found that maternal PTSD symptoms typically impact children's internalizing behaviors, while maternal symptoms of complex PTSD influence both internalizing and externalizing behaviors, particularly when mothers experience high living difficulties.
  • The research suggests that addressing maternal living conditions is crucial for improving child socioemotional outcomes and highlights the need for policies that support healing from trauma in displaced populations.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

This preliminary study examines the link between war-related auditory (pseudo)hallucinations and symptoms of acute ICD-11 posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and Complex PTSD (CPTSD) amidst ongoing conflict, with a specific focus on CPTSD. The research, which analyzed data from 2028 Israeli residents following the traumatic events of October 7, 2023, investigated the perception of non-existent sirens and their association with acute PTSD and CPTSD symptoms. The findings reveal that (pseudo)hallucinations were more prevalent among individuals with acute CPTSD symptoms compared to those with PTSD symptoms alone.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Childhood maltreatment (CM) is thought to be associated with altered responses to social stimuli and interpersonal signals. However, limited evidence exists that CM is linked to larger comfortable interpersonal distance (CID) - the physical distance humans prefer towards others during social interactions. However, no previous study has investigated this association in a comprehensive sample, yielding sufficient statistical power.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Adjustment Disorder (AjD) is a frequent diagnosis in psychological and psychiatric consultations. Recently, the ICD-11 has introduced preoccupation and failure to adapt as core symptoms of AjD. However, empirical research that explores the various possible manifestations of preoccupation and failure to adapt in AjD patients is sparse.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • * The proposed cascade model highlights the interaction of trauma exposure, demographics, cultural affiliation, and value orientations in understanding posttraumatic development.
  • * The Network Project uses mixed methods across five countries to create and validate cultural scripts of traumatic stress inventories (CSTIs) and to investigate how these scripts influence trauma's psychological impact.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

The ongoing Ukraine-Russia war triggered significant mental health consequences, particularly posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and complex PTSD (CPTSD). A population study with 1895 Ukrainians explored the association between negative war-related beliefs and risk for PTSD and CPTSD. Negative war-related beliefs were shown to be significantly linked to increased risks for PTSD and more so for CPTSD.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: The aim of this article is to summarize the current state of research on the effectiveness of psychotherapeutic treatment of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

Methods: The results of current meta-analyses and trend-setting individual studies are summarized and the most important forms of intervention are explained.

Results: The psychotherapeutic treatment methods for PTSD are very effective, the effect sizes are large and superior to those of pharmacotherapy.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

With the introduction of the ICD-11 into clinical practice, the reliable distinction between Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and Complex Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (CPTSD) becomes paramount. The semi-structured clinician-administered International Trauma Interview (ITI) aims to close this gap in clinical and research settings. This study investigated the psychometric properties of the German version of the ITI among trauma-exposed clinical samples from Switzerland and Germany.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: The novel concept of cultural scripts of trauma sequelae captures culture-specific expressions of posttraumatic distress (e.g., cognitive, emotional, interpersonal, psychosomatic changes) and their temporal associations.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: The concept of cultural scripts has proven to be very useful for describing depression-like psychological complaints in different cultural regions of the world. The article presents the galaxy model and its implementation in the model of cultural scripts theoretically for the first time and connects these with cultural psychological value research. A new, extensive series of research projects aims to investigate post-trauma -related psychological complaints in various regions of the world.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • The study investigates how traumatic stress, specifically Complex Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (CPTSD) and depression in asylum-seeking mothers, affects the mental health of their children after displacement.
  • It focuses on 127 Eritrean mothers in Israel with varying degrees of trauma and their preschool-aged children, analyzing how maternal mental health issues correlate with children's internalizing and externalizing difficulties.
  • Results indicate that mothers with CPTSD have a greater negative impact on their children's socio-emotional development compared to those with PTSD or depression alone, highlighting the need for targeted interventions for families affected by displacement.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Negative symptoms of schizophrenia remain clinically and theoretically understudied and represent an unmet psychiatric need. Negative symptoms are assumed to be related to other psychiatric disorders, but their association with dissociative symptoms is yet to be explored, particularly in light of depression and anxiety symptoms. We examined the five domains of negative symptoms (anhedonia, asociality, avolition, blunted affect and alogia) in an Israeli national sample of 1930 participants of whom 645 (33.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

This study sought to explore the association between changes in daily life and war-related anxiety. In this study, we analyzed self-reported data from 2,004 Ukrainian adults, obtained through an opportunistic survey in the Ukraine. Our assessment focused on changes in everyday routines and generalized anxiety symptoms since the Russian invasion of Ukraine on the 24 February 2022.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objective: Belsky's parenting model provides insight into the relationship between parental psychological status and parenting behaviors. However, little is known about the unique associations of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms with specific parenting behaviors. This study aimed to assess the associations of PTSD symptoms and three types of parenting behaviors (rejection, emotional warmth, and overprotection) with marital satisfaction, and to examine gender differences in these associations.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objective: This study is aimed to test the symptoms network of International Classification of Diseases, 11th Revision (ICD-11) complex posttraumatic stress disorder (CPTSD) symptoms, using data collected from Ukrainian civilians during the 2022 Russia-Ukraine war. Findings can inform our understanding of the stress response in individuals exposed to continuous trauma and give insight into the nature of CPTSD during the war.

Method: A network analysis was conducted on CPTSD symptoms as assessed by the International Trauma Questionnaire using data from a nationally representative sample of 2,000 Ukrainians.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Large-scale traumatic events have the potential to trigger psychological distress, particularly among those in the affected areas. However, the manifestation of psychological distress may vary across different types of disasters. This study thus aimed to compare the symptoms network structure of psychological distress as assessed by the Kessler Psychological Distress Scale across three types of disasters: Terror (n = 5842), COVID-19 (n = 2428), and a nature-related disaster (n = 1001).

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: There is cumulative evidence of the importance of exploring the change of dynamics between symptoms over time as reflective of consolidation of psychopathology.

Aims: To explore the interactions between symptoms of ICD-11 adjustment disorder before and after the second lockdown of the COVID-19 pandemic in Israel and identify the most central symptoms and their concurrent and prospective associations with probable adjustment disorder.

Method: This is a population-based study drawn from a probability-based internet panel.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: International Classification of Diseases, 11th revision (ICD-11) adjustment disorder (AjD) is characterized by two main symptom clusters: preoccupation with the stressor and failure to adapt to the stressor. The network analytic approach provides important information on the structural validity of a disorder and reveals which symptoms are most prominent. To date, no study compared the network structure of AjD symptoms in clinical and nonclinical samples, which could potentially inform our understanding of psychopathological mechanisms that underlie AjD and identify core targets for therapy.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Complex post-traumatic stress disorder (complex PTSD) is a severe mental disorder that emerges in response to traumatic life events. Complex PTSD is characterised by three core post-traumatic symptom clusters, along with chronic and pervasive disturbances in emotion regulation, identity, and relationships. Complex PTSD has been adopted as a new diagnosis in the ICD-11.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Childhood maltreatment (CM) is linked to impairments in various domains of social functioning. Here, we argue that it is critical to identify factors that underlie impaired social functioning as well as processes that mediate the beneficial health effects of positive relationships in individuals exposed to CM. Key research recommendations are presented, focusing on: (1) identifying attachment-related alterations in specific inter- and intrapersonal processes (e.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Adjustment disorder is one of the most widespread mental disorders worldwide. In ICD-11, adjustment disorder is characterised by two main symptom clusters: preoccupation with the stressor and failure to adapt. A network analytic approach has been applied to most ICD-11 stress-related disorders.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

The ICD-11 has introduced a new conceptualization of adjustment disorder (AjD) as a stress response syndrome with core symptoms of preoccupations and failure to adapt to the stressor. The current study aimed to assess the reliability and validity of the International Adjustment Disorder Questionnaire (IADQ) in two culturally distinct samples from Israel and Switzerland. Two samples were recruited in Israel (N = 1142) and Switzerland (N = 699) during the initial stages of the COVID-19 pandemic.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Existing research on post-traumatic sequelae suggests a positive association between fatalism and symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). However, the associations between fatalism and the new ICD-11 diagnosis of complex PTSD (CPTSD) have never been explored before.

Objective: The current study explored the association between fatalism and PTSD and CPTSD in samples from three African countries.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF