Childhood Trauma and Perceived Parenting Style in Patients with Dissociative Disorder

Numerous research has been done on dissociative disorder since ages. However, the majority of them focus on the childhood abuse that the patients had gone through, may it be in emotional, physical, or sexual form. The current study seeks to explore the presence of both childhood abuse and neglect, socio-demographic factors associated with dissociative disorder, as well as how childhood trauma and perceived parenting style are associated with dissociative disorder, and the relationship between these two factors. In this cross-sectional study, a total of 38 patients who were diagnosed with dissociative disorder from Odisha, between the age of 11-19 years were selected based on the inclusion and exclusion criteria. They filled in their socio-demographic details and completed the childhood trauma questionnaire (CTQ) and perceived parenting style scale (PPSS). The result indicates that the majority of the patients diagnosed with dissociative disorder suffered from severe physical and emotional neglect, and perceived their parents as authoritarian. The result also suggests that the emotional neglect domain of childhood trauma is associated with the authoritative perceived parenting style. The association between the emotional neglect domain of childhood trauma and authoritative perceived parenting style should be explored more.  Further studies are needed in this area to understand what causes children to feel emotionally neglected by parents with authoritative perceived parenting style.