Trial reportBMC psychiatry2022
Mental imagery in adolescent PTSD patients after child abuse: a comparison with matched healthy controls.
Trial report in BMC psychiatry, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 7 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
7 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 8 citations in OpenAlex.
- Mental imagery of suicide and non-suicidal self-injury: A meta-analysis and systematic review.Clinical psychology review · 2023Pooled it
- Frequency and correlates of suicidality in a sample of traumatized treatment-seeking refugees.BMC psychiatry · 2026Trial
- A Brief Technique to Reduce Flashbacks of Sexual Trauma in an Adolescent: Proof-of-Concept Case Study Using Imagery Interference.JMIR formative research · 2025Article
- Scene construction deficits in adolescent PTSD are in sensory, rather than spatial, imagery.Frontiers in psychology · 2025Article
- 'Flashforward' mental imagery in adolescents: exploring developmental differences and associations with mental health.Behavioural and cognitive psychotherapy · 2024Article
- Mental Imagery in the Relationship between Alexithymia and Parental Psychological Control.Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- Narrative-based autobiographical memory interventions for PTSD: a meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials.Frontiers in psychology · 2023Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
4 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundIntrusive mental imagery (MI) plays a crucial role in the maintenance of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in adults. Evidence on the characteristics of MI in adolescents suffering from PTSD is sparse. The aim of this study was to thoroughly assess MI in an adolescent sample suffering from PTSD after the experience of childhood sexual abuse and/or childhood physical abuse (CA).
methodsThirty-two adolescents with a primary diagnosis of PTSD after CA and 32 adolescents without any mental disorder and without a history of CA, matched for age and gender, completed questionnaires assessing the characteristics of negative and positive MI, as well as images of injury and death that lead to positive emotions (ID-images).
resultsThe PTSD group reported significantly more frequent, more vivid, more distressing and more strongly autobiographically linked negative MI compared to the control group. Although positive MI was highly present in both groups (PTSD: 65.6%; controls: 71.9%), no significant differences emerged between the two groups regarding the distinct characteristics of positive MI. The frequency of the ID-images did not significantly differ between the two groups (PTSD: 21.9%; controls: 9.4%), although the ID-images were more vivid in the PTSD group. DISCUSSION: Negative MI appears to be crucial in adolescent PTSD, whilst positive MI are unexpectedly common in both the PTSD and the control group. The role of positive MI as well as that of ID-images remain unclear. Specific interventions for changing negative MI that are tailored to the developmental challenges in adolescents with PTSD should be developed.
trial registrationSome of the PTSD patients in this study were also part of a randomized controlled trial on Developmentally adapted Cognitive Processing Therapy (D-CPT). This trial was registered at the German Clinical Trial Registry (GCTR), DRKS00004787 , 18 March 2013.
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