4d ago
Standing in Two Worlds-Episode 77-The Hostage's Permanent Psychological Damage Explained
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Rehabilitation Challenges of Gaza Hostages and Traumatized Battle Veterans
Trauma shakes up the personality and,sometimes, the very essence of its victims. Interpersonal trauma, moreover,often harms the capacity for healthy social and personal relationships which persists long after the traumatic episode.
Prof. Juni explains the dynamics of these lasting effects of trauma by noting that the life of an infant is usually construed by the growing child as a very threatening existence fraught with colossal danger, interspersed by facets of ultimate pleasure and safety/security. This fixes the infant into a chronic state of anxiety where the stakes are most extreme. The concomitant behavioral stance of the child devolves into a fight vs. flight modality, as the other is perceived dichotomously as devoted friends vs. ferocious foe, demon vs. and saint vs.devil/angel.
As the child develops, behaviors,stances, and attitudes moderate. Gray usurps black vs. white polarities, and extremist percepts are defensively repressed as they recede into the unconscious -- to find expression only in the dreams of older children and adults. Alas, subsequent trauma has the capacity to disrupt the mature defensive ego structure and often results in regression into the original terror-filled world of danger and extreme dichotomy. Juni likens the rehabilitated traumatized soldier or hostage to a recovered alcoholic who might slip right back to full-blown alcoholism – even many years later -- if his/her defensive wall is breached when forced to have “just one drink.”
Hostages who experience threat and abuse in close quarters with perpetrators have been noted to exhibit the Stockholm Syndrome. Dr. Juni delineates the hallmarks of this syndrome which prompt somevictims to “side with their captors.” Such dynamics may include identification with the aggressor and acceptance of abuse as justified. Juni agrees with Rabbi Kivelevitz that such a stance may sometimes be psychologically rooted in an effort to minimize the perceived threat one experiences. It is clear that this syndrome will make it difficult for a hostage to adjust functionally to social and family functioning.
Rabbi Kivelevitz points out a number of parallels between the reactions of soldiers and hostages to those of holocaust victims (who went on to be prominent political leaders, clergy, and visionaries), arguing that such observed resilience should be expected among traumatized soldiers and hostages. Dr. Juni, while agreeing with the parallel, nonetheless insists that despite the potential for adequate functioning among these groups, there is an underlying intrinsic damage to personality and egostructure which remains as a weak link which may unravel in stressful contexts.
Drawing from his clinical work with spousal abuse, Juni shares an additional dynamic specifically relevant to hostages who were forced into sexual intimacy with their captors. In situations of conflation between extreme threat and sexuality, there is apparently abreakdown of specificity in interpersonal relationship functioning whichresults in a positive attachment to the perpetrator. This accounts for the marked difficulty of abused domestic partners to leave their abusers, just as it results in positive affinity of abused hostages toward their traumatizers.Rabbi Kivelevitz points to the Biblical story of Dinah, whom the Midrash describes as adamantly professing her “love” of her abuser, Shechem. Juni mentions a cultural parallel in contemporary Arab culture, citing a recent court case in an Afghani court where an abuse victim sued that her rapist be forced to marry her.
Juni discusses a novel manifestation of the Stockholm syndrome he has observed, where family members of killed hostages have become proponents of the perspective of the Hamas perpetrators.Dynamically, this can be construed as a defensive effort to “make sense” of the specter of senseless atrocities which confronts them.
Rabbi Kivelevitz argues that Israelis have existed with an undercurrent of national trauma ever since the nation was founded and still have among the highest “happiness index” ratings worldwide.As such, they should be most primed to assimilate and rehabilitate traumatized soldiers and repatriated hostages. Juni agrees that this resilience – which is a defensive manifestation of splitting (a psychological adaptation which enables positive functioning despite strong negative and threatening factors) –is indeed an adaptive facet of Israeli function which augers well for the rehabilitation of these individuals.
Juni asserts that the Trauma Rehabilitation Mental Health structure is in place in Israel, and should be able to handle the expected influx of patients/clients. He notes that a concerted effort will be required to counter the Israeli zip-your-lip mentality which militates against victims’ admitting their fears and vulnerabilities.
Touching upon the respective mentalities of Israelis and Hamas, both discussants agree that a primary difference exists between the Israeli’s devout allegiance to the worth of each individual and theHamas stance which ignores the individual in the service of its cause. Alas, the Israeli stance is well understood by the adversaries, allowing them to use it to Israel’s disadvantage in their terrorism and hostage taking ventures.
Prof. Juni is one of the foremost research psychologists in the world today. He has published ground-breaking original research in seventy different peer reviewed journals and is cited continuously with respect by colleagues and experts in the field who have built on his theories and observations.
He studied in Yeshivas Chaim Berlin under Rav Yitzchak Hutner, and in Yeshiva University as a Talmid of Rav Joseph Dov Soloveitchik. Dr. Juni is a board member of the Association of Orthodox Jewish Scientists and has regularly presented addresses to captivated audiences. Associated with NYU since 1979, Juni has served as Director of PhD programs, all the while heading teams engaged in cutting-edge research. Professor Juni's scholarship on aberrant behavior across the cultural, ethnic, and religious spectrum is founded on psychometric methodology and based on a psychodynamic psychopathology perspective. He is arguably the preeminent expert in Differential Diagnostics, with each of his myriad studies entailing parallel efforts in theory construction and empirical data collection from normative and clinical populations.
Professor Juni created and directed the NYU Graduate Program in Tel Aviv titled Cross-Cultural Group Dynamics in Stressful Environments. Based in Yerushalayim, he collaborates with Israeli academic and mental health specialists in the study of dissonant factors and tensions in the Arab-Israeli conflict and those within the Orthodox Jewish community, while exploring personality challenges of second-generation Holocaust survivors.
Below is a partial list of the professional journals where Professor Juni has published 120 theoretical articles and his research findings (many are available online):
Journal of Forensic Psychology; Journal of Aggression, Maltreatment, and Trauma; International Review of Victimology; The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease; International Forum of Psychoanalysis; Journal of Personality Assessment; Journal of Abnormal Psychology; Journal of Psychoanalytic Anthropology; Psychophysiology; Psychology and Human Development; Journal of Sex Research; Journal of Psychology and Judaism; Contemporary Family Therapy; American Journal on Addictions; Journal of Criminal Psychology; Mental Health, Religion, and Culture.
As Rosh Beis Medrash, Rabbi Avraham Kivelevitz serves as Rav and Posek for the morning minyan at IDT. Hundreds of listeners around the globe look forward to his weekly Shiurim in Tshuvos and Poskim and Gaonic Literature.
Rav Kivelevitz is a Maggid Shiur for Dirshu International in Talmud and Halacha as well as a Dayan with the Beth Din of America.
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