Publication Date

2024

Document Type

Dissertation/Thesis

First Advisor

Lilly, Michelle M.

Degree Name

Ed.D. (Doctor of Education)

Legacy Department

Department of Psychology

Abstract

Individuals who identify as gender or sexual minorities (e.g., lesbian, gay, bisexual, pansexual, asexual, queer, transgender, nonbinary, intersex, gender nonconforming, etc.) have a high prevalence of interpersonal trauma. These individuals also experience a higher likelihood of experiencing posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms after exposure to potentially traumatic events. It has also been shown that those who identify as gender or sexual minorities experience high rates of shame due to minority stress and psychological factors such as internalized heterosexism. Experiences of shame are a central component in the development and maintenance of PTSD symptoms, particularly within this population. Self-compassion is an intervention that has been shown to reduce levels of shame and, therefore, PTSD symptoms. However, this intervention had not been tested in a population of trauma-exposed individuals who identify as gender and sexual minorities at the time of the study. The current study sought to fill this gap to identify the effectiveness of a self-compassion letter writing intervention on shame and PTSD symptoms within gender and sexual minorities who have experienced interpersonal trauma. It was found that both writing tasks resulted in an increase in self-compassion and a decrease in shame with a greater impact observed in the self-compassion letter writing condition. Although the self-compassion condition was not more effective than the control condition in decreasing PTSD symptoms, symptoms of PTSD decreased over time for the full sample. It was also found that experimental condition had an indirect effect on PTSD symptoms through change in shame scores. Intent-to-treat analyses showed that there was higher attrition among racial/ethnic minorities, suggesting that the research process and/or the self-compassion letter writing intervention itself needs to be adapted or reconsidered in future studies to ensure treatment participation and effectiveness among trauma-exposed gender and sexual minorities who are not white. With this limitation in mind, results suggest that self-compassion letter writing may be worthy of future research as it can be an effective short-term intervention administered with minimal resources to increase self-compassion, reduce shame, and possibly reduce PTSD symptoms in gender and sexual minorities.

Extent

144 pages

Language

en

Publisher

Northern Illinois University

Rights Statement

In Copyright

Rights Statement 2

NIU theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from Huskie Commons for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without the written permission of the authors.

Media Type

Text

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