Judith Lewis Herman (born 1942) is an American psychiatrist, researcher, teacher and author who focuses on understanding and treating incest and traumatic stress.
Herman is Professor of Clinical Psychiatry at Harvard University Medical School and Director of Training at the Victims of Violence Program at the Department of Psychiatry at the Cambridge Health Alliance in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and founding member of the Mental Health Group of Women.
She is a recipient of the 1996 Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies and the 2000 Woman in Science Award of the American Medical Women's Association. In 2003 he was named the Extraordinary Member of the American Psychiatric Association.
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Judith Herman is renowned for her distinctive contribution to understanding the trauma and its victims, as noted in her second book, the present classic study of the diagnostic category of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), Trauma and Recovery . There he distinguishes between the trauma of a single incident - a one - time event - what he calls Type I trauma, and complex or recurrent trauma (Type II). Type I trauma, according to the US Veterans Administration Center for Post Traumatic Stress Disorders, "accurately describes symptoms that occur when a person experiences short-lived psychological trauma." Type II - the complex concept of post-traumatic stress disorder (CPTSD) - includes "syndromes that follow a prolonged and repetitive trauma". Although not accepted by DSM-IV as a separate diagnostic category, the idea of ââcomplex trauma has been found to be useful in clinical practice.
Herman is equally influential on the order of three stages of treatment and trauma recovery. The first involved getting back the sense of security, either through therapeutic relationships, medication, relaxation exercises or a combination of all three. The second phase involves active work on trauma, fostered by a secure base, and using various psychological techniques. The last stage is represented by advances into new post-traumatic lives, perhaps extended by the experience of surviving the trauma and all involved.
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