This project has two specific aims: (1) to examine cognitive representations and coping strategies used in rape recovery; (2) to test the adequacy of a new conceptualization of long-term recovery from rape and its relationship to conceptual schemes of coping processes and recovery from traumatic events. To pursue the first aim, the applicants will investigate cognitive representations and coping patterns women use in their efforts to recover from a rape experience. this investigation will use an approach integrating three different lines of research and theorizing: (1) stress and coping, as exemplified by Lazarus and Folkman and applied to rape by Koss and Harvey; (2) post-traumatic stress responses; and (3) cognitive social psychology. To pursue the second aim, applicants propose that long-term recovery from rape occurs in two phases -- an """"""""adjustment"""""""" phase and an """"""""integration"""""""" phase. """"""""Adjustment"""""""" is posited to involve the abatement of negative symptoms, and lasts until several months beyond the first anniversary of the rape. Almost all """"""""long-term"""""""" studies of reactions to rape examine this phase, which has itself been described by Burgess and Holmstrom as involving more than one stage. In these studies the concept of recovery referred exclusively to relief of a rape's negative impacts, and implicitly or explicitly expected a return to """"""""normal"""""""" in a relatively short time period. """"""""Integration"""""""" is an addition to the concept of rape recovery. Integration is not expected to begin until adjustment has been completed. Integration is posited to take about 18 months, once a woman begins to work on it, which may not happen immediately. """"""""Integration"""""""" incorporates the idea that women cannot return to their pre-rape selves, and that a primary challenge of this phase is finding a satisfactory answer to the question """"""""Who am I now?"""""""". The timing and changing nature of cognitive representations and coping responses will be examined to determine the extent to which they comply with this new concept. Data for analysis will come from interviews and questionnaires conducted for a previous study. These 80 semi-structured, taped interviews ran three to four hours, on average, and covered many aspects of each woman's pre-rape and post-rape life as well as her reactions during and after the rape itself. The data collection instruments and interview techniques were designed in part to examine the accuracy of the adjustment- integration concept. Interviews will be transcribed and coded for content pertinent to our proposed specific aims. Analysis will seek interpretable and consistent patterns of cognitive representations, and of coping and phase patterns. The research will also examine how support, stressors, and other aspects of women's lives affect cognitive representations, coping patterns and the timing and nature of phases. The results are expected to inform clinical practice.
