Correlates of a General Psychopathology Factor within a Clinical Sample of Childhood Sexual Abuse Survivors

Hyland, Philip, Murphy, Jamie, Shevlin, Mark, Carey, Steven, Vallières, Frédérique, Murphy, David and Elklit, Ask (2018) Correlates of a General Psychopathology Factor within a Clinical Sample of Childhood Sexual Abuse Survivors. Journal of Affective Disorders, 232. pp. 109-115. ISSN 0165-0327

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Abstract

Background
Childhood sexual abuse (CSA) increases risk for most psychiatric disorders. There is evidence that the structure of psychopathology can be explained by a number of latent dimensions of psychopathology including a ‘General Psychopathology’ (P) factor. The objective of the current study was to provide the first assessment as to whether P is identifiable, and what its correlates might be in a clinical sample.

Methods
An adult, clinical sample of Danish CSA survivors (N = 420) was assessed using the Millon Clinical Multiaxial Inventory-III. Confirmatory factory analysis (CFA) was used to assess the latent structure of nine psychiatric disorders, and structural equation modelling (SEM) was used to determine correlates of the best-fitting dimensional model.

Results
CFA results favoured a bifactor model including three specific dimensions of psychopathology, “Internalizing”, “Externalizing”, and “Thought Disorder”, and a bi-factor “P”. A SEM model that included ten predictors was a good fit to the data and explained 55% of variance in ‘P’. The ‘P’ factor was significantly associated with emotional coping, negative self-worth, traumatic life events, and anxious attachments.

Limitations
Psychiatric disorders were assessed using self-report measures, and the sample was predominately female.

Conclusions
Results provide initial evidence of P in a clinical sample and several unique correlates of this factor were identified.

Item Type:	Article
Subjects:	B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > Psychology
Divisions:	School of Business > Staff Research and Publications
Depositing User:	Caoimhe Ní Mhaicín
Date Deposited:	17 Feb 2018 09:11
Last Modified:	02 May 2018 13:31
URI:	https://norma.ncirl.ie/id/eprint/2993

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