Discussion List for campus-based and allied personnel working to end gender-based violence on campus.

["Guttentag, Karen S." <>]

Hi Wade,

 

My (amateurish) sense of why this might happen is that it may reflect an effort to reestablish a sense of normalcy and to minimize the trauma of what took place. Behaving as though this interaction was normal and nothing unusual may be a coping mechanism on the part of the survivor, an attempt to convince herself/himself that what occurred was not so terrible, not so out of the ordinary, and by doing so, regain a sense of balance.

 

Hope this is helpful—and I’d love to hear other interpretations as well, as I may be off base.

 

Karen

 

Karen S. Guttentag

Associate Dean for Judicial Affairs and Student Life

Middlebury College

Middlebury, VT 05753

phone) 802-443-2024

fax) 802-443-2525

 

 

 

From: Felty, Wade P. [mailto:]
Sent: Tuesday, August 20, 2013 1:53 AM
To:
Subject: Survivors continuing relationship with attacker

 

Colleagues,

 

I want to thank all of your for your many very helpful responses to my request for information on the neurobiology of sexual assault. The works of Dr. Lisak (who I’ve heard in person and read a lot of) and Dr. Rachel Campbell (who I was not familiar with until many of you wrote in) are particularly helpful. I think I have a solid mound of information to give our Dean’s Sexual Conduct Review Board to help them understand memory problems and tonic immobility. If I haven’t thanked everyone personally, I am working on doing so.

 

The final piece I am interested in is something a few panel members have questioned me about, and which I do not have a scientific/psychiatric explanation at the moment but I have heard it is common response….what causes some victims to continue associating with their attacker? i.e. last year we had a victim talk about how she texted her attacker a few times, and they even went out on several dates, and she continued regular social contact right up to the days leading up to her disclosing to us. Is this a symptom of rape trauma syndrome? I know it is almost more understandable when they are intimate partner, but what about when they are mere acquaintances and the victim still seeks out contact with them (positive contact, not accusatory/angry contact). Some of my older faculty colleagues have trouble understanding this. I know it is a common response but I am trying to explain possible motivations.

 

Wade

 

 

Wade Felty

Wade Felty

Office of Residence Life & Housing and Judicial Affairs

Assistant Sexual Assault Response Coordinator

Randolph-Macon College

(804)-752-3234 (Office)

(717)-813-3513 (Mobile 1)

(804)-441-4187 (Mobile 2)