Date of Award

Spring 2024

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy in Clinical Psychology (PhD)

Department

Clinical Psychology

First Advisor/Committee Member

Jacob Bentley

Second Advisor/Committee Member

Lynette H. Bikos

Third Advisor/Committee Member

Jessica Carlile

Abstract

Refugees and asylum seekers account for 34.4 million people worldwide (UNHCR, 2021), and up to 40% of this population are survivors of torture (UNHCR, 2017). The Istanbul Protocol (United Nations, 2022) describes one of the explicit ends of torture as the severing of a person from their community, a breaking of their dignity and humanity. This may be done explicitly, through acts of traumatic humiliation. Traumatic humiliation includes acts such as forcing victims to eat religiously forbidden food, forced posing or touching others in culturally taboo sexual ways, forced nudity or clothing that reflects misgendering (such as “emasculating” clothing), widespread sharing of humiliating photographs or video, acts of degradation involving bodily fluids, physically or sexually assaulting victims in front of others, or forcing victims to watch the physical or sexual assault of others (Greenberg & Dratel, 2005). While research on the impact of torture is growing, little is known about the impact of traumatic humiliation as a form of torture. This study examined the impact of traumatic humiliation on posttraumatic stress and depression symptoms in survivors of torture persecuted based on their social group membership (such as marginalized genders, clans, or sexual orientations) in a sample of United States asylum applicants. Two moderation models were analyzed, one looking at the degree to which traumatic humiliation moderated the relationship between social group persecution and posttraumatic symptoms, and the second looking at the degree to which traumatic humiliation moderated the relationship between social group persecution and depression symptoms. While both moderation models were statistically non-significant, analysis showed that traumatic humiliation was a statistically significant predictor of posttraumatic stress symptoms (B = 1.14, p< .001), and both traumatic humiliation (B = 1.06, p < .001) and social group persecution (B = 0.21, p < .05) were statistically significant predictors of depression symptoms. These results suggest that more research into the unique impacts of traumatic humiliation are warranted.

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