Complex Racial Trauma: Evidence, Theory, Assessment, and Treatment

Racial trauma refers to experiences related to threats, prejudices, harm, shame, humiliation, and guilt associated with various types of racial discrimination, either for direct victims or witnesses. In North American, European, and colonial zeitgeist societies, Black, Indigenous, and people of colo...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Perspectives on psychological science 2023-05, Vol.18 (3), p.675-687
Main Author: Cénat, Jude Mary
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Childhood
Cognition
Colonialism
Complex
Complex societies
Guilt
Health behavior
Health status
Humans
Humiliation
Internalization
Life course
Life events
Mental Health
Microaggression
Microaggressions
Minority & ethnic groups
Psychological Trauma
Racial discrimination
Racial Groups
Racism
Racism - psychology
Self concept
Shame
Systemic Racism
Trauma
Victimization
Victims
Western society
Witnesses
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Summary:Racial trauma refers to experiences related to threats, prejudices, harm, shame, humiliation, and guilt associated with various types of racial discrimination, either for direct victims or witnesses. In North American, European, and colonial zeitgeist societies, Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC) experience racial microaggressions and interpersonal, institutional, and systemic racism on a repetitive, constant, inevitable, and cumulative basis. Although complex trauma differs from racial trauma in its origin, the consistency of racist victimization beyond childhood, and the internalized racism associated with it, strong similarities exist. Similar to complex trauma, racial trauma surrounds the victims’ life course and engenders consequences on their physical and mental health, behavior, cognition, relationships with others, self-concept, and social and economic life. There is no way to identify racial trauma other than through a life-course approach that captures the complex nature of individual, collective, historical, and intergenerational experiences of racism experienced by BIPOC communities in Western society. This article presents evidence for complex racial trauma (CoRT), a theoretical framework of CoRT, and guidelines for its assessment and treatment. Avenues for future research, intervention, and training are also presented.
ISSN:1745-6916
1745-6924
DOI:10.1177/17456916221120428