title: Posttraumatic anger, recalled peritraumatic emotions, and PTSD in victims of violent crime.
abstract: A mixed cross-sectional and longitudinal design was employed to explore the association between posttraumatic anger and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD; symptoms) in victims of civilian violence. It was speculated that this relationship is mainly due to concurrent recalled peritraumatic emotions. Such emotions may be interpreted to result from anger-rooted threat perceptions and to share similarities with posttraumatic intrusion symptoms. In addition, predictors of PTSD maintenance were investigated. Cross-sectional data indicated that posttraumatic anger and several indices of PTSD were highly interconnected. Recalled peritraumatic emotions partly accounted for the relation between posttraumatic anger and posttraumatic intrusions (n = 177). Only posttraumatic intrusions were associated with PTSD symptom persistence at follow-up (n = 56). Findings were discussed in light of study limitations and directions for future research.
authors: Leiden University, Leiden, Netherlands. m.j.j.kunst@law.leidenuniv.nl
authors: M J J
authors: MJ
authors: Kunst
authors: F W
authors: FW
authors: Winkel
authors: S
authors: S
authors: Bogaerts