Psychology Essay: Analyzing PTSD Case Study and Manifestations

This psychology essay examines a case study involving two school friends who experienced different degrees of psychological distress following a school shooting, focusing on post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The essay delves into the disorder's background, supported by relevant theories and evidence, and aims to analyze the varying manifestations of PTSD in individuals exposed to the same traumatic event. It discusses the differences in psychological composition and reactions to trauma, exploring risk and resilience factors that influence PTSD development. The essay explores the symptoms, including reexperiencing, mood and cognition, avoidance, and arousal and reactivity syndromes, along with evidence-based treatment approaches like Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) and Emotional Processing Theory. The essay highlights the importance of early intervention and the role of various psychological theories in understanding and treating PTSD.

Running head: PSYCHOLOGY
Psychology
Name of Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Introduction
Psychology is a vast branch of science involving mind and behavior that is inclusive of
the unconscious as well as conscious aspects. The psychologists aim to explain the role of mental
functions embedded in social and individual behavior (Seligman & Csikszentmihalyi, 2014).
They tend to explore the various biological as well as physiological processes which determine
the cognitive functions as well as behaviors. This branch of medicine is used for the treatment of
the mental health ailments and towards understanding various activities of the human beings.
The post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is considered as a mental disorder concerning
a traumatic event that has happened to the person (Seligman & Csikszentmihalyi, 2014). This
essay is based on the case study in which two school friends suffered different degrees of
psychological manifestations resulting from minor injuries during a school shooting. This essay
would discuss the backdrop of this disorder with the help of relevant theories and evidences. The
main purpose of this essay is to analyze the underlying reasons for the manifestations of PTSD
and how it expresses itself differently in different persons.
Discussion
The case study incident stresses on the fact that one student has developed PTSD while
the other did not, though both of them has been subjected to the same stimuli. No two human
beings are same (Seligman & Csikszentmihalyi, 2014). They have different psychological
composition and they react in different ways in same situations. Psychologists opine that it is
normal to feel terrified after a traumatic event. The post traumatic fear releases hormones in the
body which prepares the body to respond to various danger and protect himself from harm
(Neisser, 2014).Every person undergoes through this process after trauma but most of them

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recover from these symptoms in a natural way. But, there are some people who are unable to
cope up and they continue to experience the trauma (Seligman & Csikszentmihalyi, 2014). Such
persons are diagnosed with PTSD. Such kind of persons always feels frightened and stressed out
even when there are no signs of danger.
According to Wickens et al. (2015), PTSD is a particular mental health condition in
which the condition is being triggered by the experience of particular events. There are common
post-traumatic reactions that are expressed by the victim such as trouble sleeping, increased
jumpiness, stress and others (Seligman & Csikszentmihalyi, 2014). There are instances when the
victims often feel susceptible to substance abuse, alcohol and number of other anxiety related
disorders (Seligman & Csikszentmihalyi, 2014). Post-traumatic stress disorder is a physical
process that is associated with brain and the victims are said to be suffering from disruptive
context processing. This level of processing is considered as one of the main brain function that
is considered with the recognition of stimulus and it may require different degree of responses as
per the involved context.
The child who displayed the characteristics of PTSD may have been a victim of physical
abuse in the past. Age plays an important role in the development of PTSD and the youths who
have been victims of sexual abuse in their childhood are more susceptible to this trauma (Buss,
2015). The severity of the different combat exposure is considered as a strong predictor for the
development of PTSD. The child may be exposed to severe traumatic experiences in the past
which has made him to react more to another traumatic experience, the school shooting incident
(Neisser, 2014). He may also have a family history of substance abuse in which he may have
faced abuses in early stages of his life.

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There are many factors known as risk factors, which make one person more likely to
develop PTSD. There are other factors known as resilience factors and they are usually present in
the individual before the trauma (Zoladz & Diamond, 2016). These resilience factors usually
tend to reduce the risk of PTSD. There are various risk factors such as living through dangerous
events, getting hurt, feeling horror, dealing with instances of stress and others. The various
resilience factors include seeking out support from various other people, learning to feel good,
developing a coping strategy, being able to act in a different manner and others (Neisser, 2014).
Research shows that not all people develop PTSD and this is the exact reason why one
student suffered from the syndrome while the other was able to carry his life on a normal basis
(Fumis et al., 2014). The person who developed PTSD may be survivors of sexual or physical
assault, where he may be subjected to harsh conditions. He may be subjected to more severe
events in life, which made him to develop the syndrome after the school shooting. There can also
be sudden experiences in his life such as sudden demise of a close person or separation from a
loved one (Zoladz & Diamond, 2016). The traumas put the persons on higher risk in their life.
They may be suffering from severe biological factors such as genes in which the people are more
likely to develop PTSD.
There are several symptoms of post traumatic stress disorder that are evident in
individuals in different degrees (Baldwin et al., 2017). However, the symptoms of this syndrome
might last for more than one month and they should be severe so that they interfere with the
normal functioning of life. It is agreed that there are several symptoms that should be present for
at least a month for detecting the person with post-traumatic stress syndrome (Zoladz &
Diamond, 2016). The concerned person needs to be evaluated if he expresses the following

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syndrome for at least one month or at least two month. It is important to deduce conclusions only
after confirming the symptoms of PTSD. They are-
 Reexperiencing symptoms- These can be flashbacks, frightening thoughts or bad dreams
that are associated with the trauma. These can cause major issues in the everyday routine
of the human beings (Zoladz & Diamond, 2016). There can be several triggers for these
symptoms such as any objects, words and situations which may be reminders of the
events.
 Mood and cognition syndrome- The concerned person who is suspected of having
suffered from PTSD usually has several symptoms related to their mood and cognition.
He may have trouble in remembering the important features of an event. He may be
having negative feelings about himself or regarding other persons, which makes them
overall negative individuals (Van der Kolk, (2017). They may be slowly losing interests
in important activities that they love. They may also suffer from various distorted feelings
such as blame or guilt.
 Avoidance syndrome- The person who would have the possibility of developing PTSD
may have various avoidance symptoms such as staying away from various events, place
and objects that may remind him of the concerned trauma experience (for example school
shooting in this case) (Zoladz & Diamond, 2016).
 Arousal and reactivity syndrome- These symptoms are usually stagnant and may trigger
off when there are similar memories of the traumatic event (Zoladz & Diamond, 2016).
These symptoms make the person feel angry and stresses. There are various symptoms of
it such as being startled, feeing of tense and having difficulty in sleeping (Alexander et

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al., 2017). The concerned person must be having severe angry outbursts, which may be a
clear sign of PTSD.
As opined by Newman et al., (2015), the cognitive behavioral theory (CBT) is used for
improving the mental health conditions of the patients and is used in evidence based practices.
CBT is found to be an effective treatment in less severe forms of mental sickness such as PTSD.
This technique focuses on the solving of the current problems as well as altering the unfavorable
patterns in the cognition of human beings (Zoladz & Diamond, 2016). There can be various
levels of cognitions such as beliefs, thoughts and attitudes. CBT is considered to be having six
stages such as assessment or the psychological assessments, reconceptualisation, skills
acquisition, skills consolidation, generalization and post-treatment assessment (Beck, Davis &
Freeman, 2015). The following diagram displays how the different components of thoughts,
emotions and behaviors influence each other on a regular basis. The triangle in the center
represents the fact that the core beliefs of the human beings can be summed together in three
different categories such as others, self and future (Zoladz & Diamond, 2016).

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Fig: Cognitive Behavioral theory
Source: (Van Rooij et al., 2016)
PTSD can be caused due to rape and this should be treated accordingly. The Foe and
Rothbaum’s theory focuses on the ability to be aware of and drawing knowledge of the various
social difficulties as well as psychological difficulties faced by the victim (Zoladz & Diamond,
2016). There are usually three components of the PTSD intervention such as exposure, stress
inoculation training and restructuring (Rizzo et al., 2017). The exposure may take the form of
prolonged exposure such as breathing retraining in which the client is being developed an ability
of presenting the rationale for the purpose of breathing retraining (Möller et al., 2014). There can
be prolonged imaginable exposure to the memories of the assault, which has the ability for
explaining the rationale for relieving (Zoladz & Diamond, 2016). The cognitive restructuring is

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considered as the ability of the identification of important themes which would benefit from the
cognitive restructuring (Zoladz & Diamond, 2016). There are also different degrees of stress
inoculation training such as the ability to utilize clinical judgments in order to determine the
various stress inoculation techniques that would be employed (Zoladz & Diamond, 2016).
One of the most advanced theories of treating PTSD is the Emotional Processing
Theory. This is a highly influential treatment in the treating PTSD patients and often led to
successful treatment when there is prolonged exposure (Wisco, Baker & Sloan, 2016). This
theory believes in the fact that the fear of something is usually being activated by various
associative networks which include information about the various feared stimulus, avoidance
responses or escape. The theory also focuses on the fact the fact that the exposure has the
capability of altering the relationships between the various fear stimulus and the networks
(Wisco, Baker & Sloan, 2016). The fear is considered as the problematic factor when it is intense
and ceases to get away even when there are no signs of danger. In such cases, there are
possibilities of pathological or maladaptive fear structures (Zoladz & Diamond, 2016). The
theory believes in the fact that the chronic avoidance can give rise to maladaptive schemas so
that the people are not present in particular situation for a long time. The network needs to be
adapted and the new forms of information should be encoded with the fear network. This is
usually accomplished by habituation, in which the patients start learning the things that they are
afraid of (Zalta, 2015). There are usually two kinds of habituation in this form of therapy. There
are within-session habituation in which the fear decreases during the course of a therapy session.
The other kind of the habituation takes place when there is between-session habituation. This
type of habituation occurs when the level of fear decreases in between the different therapy
sessions (Wisco, Baker & Sloan, 2016). The habituation doesn’t guarantee that the fear would go

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on completely. It is obvious that many people would continue to experience a moderate level of
fear when they are bombarded with certain situations.
Conclusion
The PTSD is a difficult mental condition in which it is very important to start
intervention as early as possible. The child who developed the syndrome might have been
exposed to a number of risk factors which were discussed. There are various kinds of risk factors
and resilience factors which play a key role in PTSD. The various theories attributed to PTSD
are discussed such as cognitive behaviour theory, emotional processing theory, Foe and
Rothbaum’s theory and others. These intervention techniques can be used for treating the victims
suffering from PTSD. It is important to treat the victim with PTSD at an early stage otherwise it
may be dangerous. This essay would broaden the understanding of PTSD, likely development in
various individuals and how it can be intervened.

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