Description

Immediate dispatch from Somerset. Nice book in great condition. Pages in unused condition. Softcover. English. See images for condition.

About the book >.>.> In fact no one really knows how important stressful events are in deter- mining the nature and course of mental illness. In this regard the diagnosis of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) was his- toric because it reasserted the previously abandoned paradigm of traumatic exposure as a major etiologic agent of psychiatric symptoms. Indeed as psychiatry’s interest began to shift from develop- mental models and the importance of earlier experiences toward a focus on the neurobiologic basis of mental illness in the late 1960s and early 1970s there was reduced emphasis on stress and trauma as major causes of psychiatric disorder. It seemed inarguable at the time that if mental illness was in the brain or in the genes then stress was merely a precipitant of conditions that were bound to appear sooner or later or an exacerbator of existing or dormant symptomatology. The establishment of the diagnosis of PTSD provided the field with an observational framework for a more systematic study of the effects of stress and trauma. It has now been almost 20 years since the appearance of PTSD in the DSM and much information has now been gathered about the effects of extreme trauma. However the knowledge that has accrued has presented some important challenges to the mental health field. For example although it is now clear from prevalence studies that PTSD is a very serious public health problem this disorder is not an in- evitable outcome of traumatic exposure. (LL)