PSYC 4364 Lecture Notes - Lecture 11: School Bus, Posttraumatic Stress Disorder
● School-based studies of children following disasters
○ We know much less about kids and trauma than we do adults (mild diff in
expression of ptsd b/tw kids and adults, exp = communication, kids often reenact
the situation/play out what happened or what they did)
○ The impetus for the study of ptsd among kids
■ Evolution of PTSD
● Railway Spine: 1850s (adult trauma is called this)
○ People thought you dev ptsd if you were in a train wreck
○ Dickens was in train wreck, not physically injured but was
affected deeply by the trauma, died 3 years after
■ Defining Event:
● Chowchilla, 1976
○ School bus kidnapping (26 kids, 5-14 yrs)
○ Entombed for 27 hours
○ Woman named Terr, psychiatrist at columbia took taxi all
the way to ca to interview these kids
○ Interviewed kids again 35 years later “the memories never
stop”
■ Many had gone to prison or substance abuse
issues. Ptsd had been maintained all throughout
life.
■ Main factors that maintain PTSD = triggers
■ First child diagnosis of ptsd in 1987
○ Children are understudied in disaster research (priorities, access/logistics)
○ Adults often under estimate impact of disaster on kids b/c don’t understand
trauma and the fact that kids do understand what happened and are forever
impacted
○ Annette Lagreca involved w/ school based studies of kids after a disaster****
■ Parents don’t realize kids are suffering from ptsd/struggling after trauma
○ School based research provides excellent opportunity to gain access to large
numbers of children and adolescents****** school = best setting for child
research after natural/tech disasters
■ Major problem is emphasis of 3 R’s
● (teachers only want to focus on reading/writing/arithmetic and
don’t have time for researchers to study kids in school)
○ Once kids remember one trauma, it brings up memories of other traumatic
events/stressors that they at first didn’t remember. Talking about one
trauma/experience may bring up that memory
○ Pynoos : social contract
■ b/tw kids and their parents; parents should always be there for their kids
(protect them)
■ If that doesn’t happen, the kids’ behavior/thinking becomes disregulated
and has very serious/long consequences
Document Summary
We know much less about kids and trauma than we do adults (mild diff in expression of ptsd b/tw kids and adults, exp = communication, kids often reenact the situation/play out what happened or what they did) The impetus for the study of ptsd among kids. Railway spine: 1850s (adult trauma is called this) People thought you dev ptsd if you were in a train wreck. Dickens was in train wreck, not physically injured but was affected deeply by the trauma, died 3 years after. School bus kidnapping (26 kids, 5-14 yrs) Woman named terr, psychiatrist at columbia took taxi all the way to ca to interview these kids. Interviewed kids again 35 years later the memories never stop . Many had gone to prison or substance abuse issues. Main factors that maintain ptsd = triggers. First child diagnosis of ptsd in 1987. Children are understudied in disaster research (priorities, access/logistics)