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Seeing the silver lining: potential benefits of trauma exposure in college students
Damion J Grasso1, Lawrence H Cohen, Jason S Moser
1Department of Psychology, University of Delaware, 108 Wolf Hall, East Delaware Avenue, Newark, DE 19716, USA. dgrasso@psych.udel.edu
Abstract:
In the current study we compare college students exposed to a potentially traumatic event (PTE) meeting self-report criteria for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), PTE-exposed students not meeting criteria for PTSD, and non-exposed students on measures of perceived social support, self-esteem, and optimism (i.e., personal resources) and report use of specific coping strategies. Results indicate that the PTE-exposed/probable PTSD group reported fewer personal resources, greater use of avoidance-focused coping, and less use of approach-focused coping than the other two groups. The PTE-exposed/no PTSD group reported greater perceived social support and less use of avoidance-focused coping than the non-exposed group. We discuss the findings' implications for the prevention and treatment of trauma-related psychopathology.
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