Complex trauma events have been defined as chronic, interpersonal traumas that begin early in life (Cook, Blaustein, Spinazzola, & van der Kolk, 2003). The complex trauma definition has been examined in adults, as indicated by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (4th ed., DSM-IV) field trial, however, this research was lacking in child populations. The symptom presentations of complexly traumatized children were contrasted with those exposed to other, less severe trauma ecologies that met 1 or 2 features of the complex trauma definition.

The WHO International Classification of Diseases, 11th version (ICD-11), has proposed two related diagnoses, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and complex PTSD within the spectrum of trauma and stress-related disorders. To use latent profile analysis (LPA) to determine whether there are classes of individuals that are distinguishable according to the PTSD and complex PTSD symptom profiles and to identify potential differences in the type of stressor and severity of impairment associated with each profile.

This paper describes the development and preliminary validation of the Developmental Trauma Inventory (DTI), which is a 36-item, retrospective, self-administered screen for interpersonal childhood trauma experiences developed specifically for the South African context. Preliminary validation of the inventory was conducted using a sample of 720 school-going adolescents attending a high school in the Durban Metropolitan area (South Africa).

The concurrent criterion-related validity of the Structured Interview for Disorders of Extreme Stress (SIDES-SR) was examined in a cross-sectional study of 719 secondary school students attending a high school in Durban, South Africa. For purposes of analysis, exposure to complex developmental trauma was defined as exposure to either chronic (>1 month) and/or multiple incidents (5+ types) of interpersonal victimisation prior to the age of 18 years.