PTSD is a highly heterogeneous disorder comprising internalizing and externalizing symptoms divided into clusters of intrusion, avoidance, negative cognition and mood, and hyperarousal. Nearly 16% of children and adolescents develop post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) following trauma exposure. Population-based and clinical-based studies indicate that a vast number of children and adolescents are exposed to one or several potentially traumatic events (PTEs). ConclusionĪs negative beliefs, emotional numbing symptoms, concentration problems and irritability may be especially related to functional impairment in traumatized children and adolescents, monitoring and targeting these symptoms throughout therapy might be of particular importance to restore functioning as early as possible and to facilitate overall recovery. Further, the hyperarousal symptom irritability showed a unique high association with functional impairment in the US sample. Negative beliefs, detachment from others, inability to experience positive emotions, and diminished interest in activities within the symptom cluster negative alterations in cognitions and mood, and the hyperarousal symptom concentration problems accounted for the largest proportions of unique variance explained in functional impairment in both samples. Utilizing relative importance analyses, unique shared variance of each DSM-5 PTSS with functional impairment were estimated in clinical samples of 3400 Norwegian ( M age = 14.18, SD age = 2.49, range age = 7–17) and 747 US ( M age = 10.76, SD age = 3.10, range age = 7–17) children and adolescents from naturalistic settings. Identifying PTSS that have the most impact on functional impairment can broaden our understanding of post-trauma reactions and guide the selection of treatment components and techniques required to help patients to restore functioning following trauma exposure.
This study aims to provide a better understanding of the individual impact of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM-5) post-traumatic stress symptoms (PTSS) on functional impairment in trauma-exposed children and adolescents.