Self-Deprivation: A Proposal for a Maladaptive Behavioral Outcome for Survivors of Childhood Maltreatment

Childhood maltreatment is associated with significant psychological distress and coping-related maladaptive behaviors that can extend into adulthood. Non-suicidal self-injury is one form of maladaptive coping characterized by engaging in the commission of self-harm. This study explored if coping with childhood maltreatment may manifest in different forms, including behavioral omission in which an individual harms themselves through a lack of self-care. We proposed the novel construct of self-deprivation as an omissive self-harming behavior. Self-deprivation is defined as engaging in low levels of self-care motivated by an intent to harm oneself. One hundred twenty adults (72% women; M age = 31.5) with reported childhood maltreatment were recruited from an online research platform using voluntary response sampling for our cross-sectional, survey-based study. Participants responded to questions about their trauma history, self-care behaviors, and the motivations underlying their decisions about such behaviors. We found a significant, negative relationship between history of childhood maltreatment and frequency of self-care (r(118) = -.210, p = .02). We then used PROCESS macro to examine the meditating role of an motivation to harm oneself. Consistent with the construct of self-deprivation, this association was significantly mediated by an intrapersonal motivation to harm oneself (ab = -.0692, CI [-.1605, -.0021]). These findings provided preliminary support for the novel construct of self-deprivation. Results have implications for both research and clinical practice, including evidence for omissive self-harming behaviors that upon future research may be relevant to the overall framework of self-harm. Further study with different methodologies and populations are needed to continue the exploration and boundaries of this construct.

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s40653-024-00667-w.