Lifetime Victimization History, Demographics, and Clinical Status in Female Psychiatric Emergency Room Patients

Abstract

Studies on the impacts of violence often overlook the moderating role of social or demographic variables and the confounding effects of different victimization experiences on the same individual. In the present study, 93 adult women presenting to an urban psychiatric emergency room were interviewed regarding their lifetime victimization history, and their charts were examined for relevant demographic and psychiatric variables. Self-reported childhood sexual and physical abuse were common in this sample (53% and 42%, respectively). Adult physical assaults outside of a relationship were described by 29% of patients, 37% reported adult sexual assaults or rapes, and 42% stated that they had experienced one or more physical assaults within an adult relationship. Childhood and adult victimization experiences were intercorrelated and were associated with certain sociodemographic variables. Logistic regression analyses indicated that both child abuse and adult assaults were uniquely associated with psychiatric difficulties, even after controlling for relevant background variables. Childhood sexual abuse was the most powerful predictor of later psychiatric symptoms and disorders.