Special issue: 'Trauma and PTSD: Setting the research agenda'

Trauma and PTSD: setting the research agenda Miranda Olff, Cherie Armour, Chris Brewin, Marylene Cloitre, Julian D. Ford, Jane Herlihy, Ruth Lanius, Rita Rosner, Ulrike Schmidt, Stuart Turner

Re-experiencing traumatic events in PTSD: new avenues in research on intrusive memories and flashbacks Chris R. Brewin

The underlying dimensionality of PTSD in the diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders: where are we going? Cherie Armour

A plea for symptom-based research in psychiatry Ulrike Schmidt

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Mobile mental health: a challenging research agenda

The field of mobile health (“m-Health”) is evolving rapidly and there is an explosive growth of psychological tools on the market. Exciting high-tech developments may identify symptoms, help individuals manage their own mental health, encourage help seeking, and provide both preventive and therapeutic interventions. This development has the potential to be an efficient cost-effective approach reducing waiting lists and serving a considerable portion of people globally (“g-Health”). However, few of the mobile applications (apps) have been rigorously evaluated.

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Prolonged grief: setting the research agenda

Background: Prolonged grief disorder is proposed for the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-11), though it was rejected as a diagnosis for DSM-5.
Objective: This review outlines findings and defines important areas for future research viewed from a lifespan perspective.
Results: The development and psychometric evaluation of measures for the new diagnosis is paramount, specifically for children and adolescents. Treatments need to be adapted for specific subgroups and research findings have to be disseminated into various professional settings.

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The ‘‘one size fits all’’ approach to trauma treatment: should we be satisfied?

There have been significant advances in the treatment of posttraumatic stress disorder in the last two decades. Further improvements in outcomes will be supported by recognition of the heterogeneity of symptoms in trauma populations and the development of treatments that promote the tailoring of interventions according to patient needs. Collaboration with patients regarding preferences about treatment structure, process, and outcomes is critical and will benefit the effectiveness and quality of treatments as well as the speed of their dissemination.

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Complex PTSD: research directions for nosology/ assessment, treatment, and public health

Complex posttraumatic stress disorder (CPTSD) in children and adolescents extends beyond the core PTSD symptoms to dysregulation in three psychobiological domains: (1) emotion processing, (2) self-organization (including bodily integrity), and (3) relational functioning.

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Trauma-related dissociation and altered states of consciousness: a call for clinical, treatment, and neuroscience research

The primary aim of this commentary is to describe trauma-related dissociation and altered states of consciousness in the context of a four-dimensional model that has recently been proposed (Frewen & Lanius, 2015). This model categorizes symptoms of trauma-related psychopathology into (1) those that occur within normal waking consciousness and (2) those that are dissociative and are associated with trauma-related altered states of consciousness (TRASC) along four dimensions: (1) time; (2) thought; (3) body; and (4) emotion.

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Untested assumptions: psychological research and credibility assessment in legal decision-making

Background: Trauma survivors often have to negotiate legal systems such as refugee status determination or the criminal justice system. Methods & results: We outline and discuss the contribution which research on trauma and related psychological processes can make to two particular areas of law where complex and difficult legal decisions must be made: in claims for refugee and humanitarian protection, and in reporting and prosecuting sexual assault in the criminal justice system.

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A plea for symptom-based research in psychiatry

Background: The significant proportion of patients suffering from subthreshold diagnoses such as partial posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) shows that today’s diagnostic entities do not fully meet the reality and needs of clinical practice. Moreover, as stated also in the recently announced concept of research domain criteria (RDoC), the use of today’s traditional diagnostic systems in psychiatric research does not sufficiently promote an integrative understanding of mental disorders across multiple units of analysis from behavior to neurobiology.

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The underlying dimensionality of PTSD in the diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders: where are we going?

There has been a substantial body of literature devoted to answering one question: Which latent model of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) best represents PTSD’s underlying dimensionality? This research summary will, therefore, focus on the literature pertaining to PTSD’s latent structure as represented in the fourth (DSM-IV, 1994) to the fifth (DSM-5, 2013) edition of the DSM.

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Re-experiencing traumatic events in PTSD: new avenues in research on intrusive memories and flashbacks

Posttraumatic flashbacks, consisting of the intrusive re-experiencing of traumatic experiences in the present, have been more clearly defined for the first time in DSM-5 and have been identified as a unique symptom of posttraumatic stress disorder in the proposed ICD-11 diagnostic criteria. Relatively little research into flashbacks has been conducted, however, and new research efforts are required to understand the cognitive and biological basis of this important symptom.

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