Book Review: “Trauma and Recovery” by Judith Herman
In Judith Herman’s seminal work on the study of pain and suffering, she explains the complexities of how trauma inserts itself into the brain’s function and daily life. The work was originally published in 1992 but has been updated with new findings as recently as 2022, to include conclusions made in the subject and partially inspired by the original publication. What’s most significant about this work to the subject of forensic behavioral analysis is its insights into how trauma “is an inherently political enterprise because it calls attention to the experience of oppressed people” (Herman, pg. 345), which aligns with the criminological theory that environment and circumstances are what’s behind an individual’s motivation to commit crime. This is how trauma can predict future criminal activity.
In one chapter, the connection between these two is especially clear: chapter five, which discusses child abuse. The book chronicles many victim accounts, and when grouped together like in this chapter, they present a whole image of what trauma does to the mind of people who face it, particularly children. Dissociation, social isolation, and mistrust of others are all common characteristics in the abused child, but one characteristic stands out as especially predictive of future criminal activity: “When it is impossible to avoid the reality of the abuse, the child must construct some system of meaning that justifies it” (Herman, pg. 150). As mentioned above, and exhibited in Herman’s description of the abused child, a prevailing theory for criminal behavior (“social learning theory”) is that we model what we observe in our environment and continue to let these behaviors exist in our environments when they go without punishment, allowing, for example, the continuous cycle of abuse and trauma to exist within generations of families (Rousseau, Module One).
Trauma, abuse specifically, can be detrimental to anybody, but is especially harmful for children who grow up in an abusive environment and aren’t aware that abuse is antisocial behavior. They develop a “malignant sense of inner badness [that] is often camouflaged by the abused child’s persistent attempts to be good. In the effort to placate the abusers, the child victim often becomes a superb performer” (Herman, pg. 154). This can develop into antisocial behavior in the child, since they aren’t aware of proactive ways of functioning in everyday life, which presents to those outside of the toxic environment as mentally ill behavior that is a product of the abuse. A child’s social environment, along with the cognitive impairment caused by the child’s own beliefs on what proactive behavior looks like, leads them to commit antisocial behavior. It should come as no surprise that nearly seventy percent of youth involved in the juvenile justice system show signs of mental illness/distress (Rousseau, Module Four).
To conclude the chapter, Herman explores how traumatized children grow into adulthood and how they cope with their memories of abuse. Though the possible generational trauma that may occur is persistent, Herman notices a different trend: many survivors go to great lengths to avoid treating others as they were treated. Many express fear and anxiety over their interpersonal relationships, and “as survivors attempt to [engage in] adult relationships, the psychological defenses formed in childhood become increasingly maladaptive” (Herman, pgs. 166-67). The conclusion that Herman comes to is that a changing perspective on trauma, and increased access to mental health resources, can help reduce the strain and impact that trauma may have on the mind and body. It’s clear while reading that the text is the foundation of our current understanding on the topic of trauma, along with being multifaceted in its application towards academic disciplines. Pain and suffering occur in everyone’s life, so by better understanding the effect of some of the most harmful forms of pain on a person’s daily function then we
References
Herman, J.L. (2022). “Trauma and Recovery: The Aftermath of Violence – From Domestic Abuse to Political Terror.” Hachette Book Group, Inc.
Rousseau, D. (2025). “Forensic Behavioral Analysis: Module One.” Boston University.
Rousseau, D. (2025). “Forensic Behavioral Analysis: Module Four.” Boston University.