The lower endorsement of the two trauma items and one schizoid personality item may be the result of the stigma that is associated with abuse, specifically sexual abuse, and severe mental illness, e.g., being afraid of being crazy. For social support, participants indicated that a majority felt they had family members who they could talk to and rely on. Similarly high was the frequency for having peers to hang out with and not talk about work or family issues. Overall, nearly all participants indicated at least one form of social support. That is, they said yes to at least one or more items on the survey. Affirmative responses for substance problems were calculated for answers that indicated some lifetime use. For example, positive answers to using substances one year ago or more recently were coded yes. The majority of participants said that alcohol and other drug use never made them feel depressed or experience any other kind of psychological problem. Half of the participants indicated that they used AOD weekly or more often in the past 2-12 months compared to a third saying they were trying to hide AOD use, and parents or others complained about their AOD use for the same time frame. Irrespective of a time frame, a majority of participants reported using AOD weekly, and indicated that others were complaining about their AOD use at some point in their lives. Therefore, it appears that a large proportion of the sample showed problematic substance use behaviors or substance problems. Table 1 represents the percentages of affirmative responses to the study items.In order to address hypothesis 2.1, a CFA determined whether the measurement model for trauma,growing cannabis outdoors schizoid personality, social support, and substance problems was valid for the youth offender sample. A CFA was performed on the entire sample using the factor structure indicated by previous research.
The aim of the CFA was to validate the four-factor structure for the sample; that is, it served to reveal whether the four latent constructs can be measured by the observed variables or survey items. The trauma factor was specified by eight indicators, all of which comprised a sub-scale of past traumatic experiences on the GAIN General Victimization Scale. Schizoid personality consisted of six indicators, all of which reflect criteria of the DSM-IV-TR and relevant case studies . Substance problems were measured by five indicators of the recency of problematic drug-using behaviors. Social support was measured by nine indicators capturing different sources of support at school, work, home, or outside of school. Each indicator had an error term indicated by the small error pointing to it as depicted in Figure 1. The error on the indicator reflects variance that is not explained by the latent factor. Factor loadings were considered adequate for values greater than 0.30 . The unstandardized factor loading of the reference variable for each factor was set to 1.0, while the remaining variables were allowed to be freely estimated. The following goodness-of-fit statistics helped to determine adequate model fit: the comparative fit index , the Tucker-Lewis Index , and the root-mean-square error of approximation were consulted. CFI and TLI values close to .95 , and RMSEA values below .08 were considered adequate . The chi-square fit statistic was examined but given less weight in determining fit because of its sensitivity to sample size and the increased likelihood for committing a type I error . Modification indices were requested in order to assess whether correlating any indicator error terms would improve overall fit. Decisions for modifications were based on the value of the modification index, the standardized expected parameter change, parsimony, and general fit. Good model fit demonstrated how well the estimated variance-covariance matrix resembled the observed variance-covariance matrix.
Good model fit indicates that the model is appropriate to detect observed relationships and that it is able to explain a large percentage of the endogenous variables. Moreover, parsimony is a critical component of a good model since highly complex models have less free parameters and tend to have more constraints. Finally, the weighted root-mean-square residual , which is a relatively new fit index, was not considered to determine the viability of the model because of a lack of established research on it. A SEM model was specified in which psychological trauma was hypothesized to have an indirect effect onto substance problems and a direct effect on schizoid personality. Another path was modeled from schizoid personality to social support and to substance problems. Social support had a direct regression path onto substance problems. Together, trauma, schizoid personality, and support, were modeled to predict substance problems. All modeled relations are depicted in Figure 2. Factor loadings specified for each factor were allowed to be freely estimated, except for the reference indicator for each factor that was constrained to be 1.0 as part of unit-loading identification. Akin to the CFA, WLSMV was used as an estimation method, which was selected in the presence of dichotomous indicators in Mplus. Since model fit was good, no modifications were made. Results for research hypotheses 3.1-3.5 show that the following path coefficients were significant in the hypothesized direction: trauma significantly and positively predicted schizoid traits when controlling for social support and substance problems. In other words, an increase in one standard deviation in trauma yielded a .53 standard deviation increase in schizoid personality characteristics. This supported hypothesis 3.1. The effect size suggested that trauma explains 28% of the variance of the schizoid personality factor.Another set of findings is related to the viability of the constructs of trauma, support, personality, and substance problems when applied to the youth offender population.
Many of those constructs have been primarily employed with non-offending youths or adults, so that it was important to test whether they would work equally well with this sample before moving into the structural model analysis. Results show that these constructs worked well for assessing personality and risk constructs among youths on probation, and that these constructs are interrelated in meaningful ways. This suggested that the subsequent analysis of direction and significance of the paths between them could be conducted. The relations among the four constructs were examined. It was hypothesized that trauma would have a direct, positive, and significant effect on the development of schizoid personality traits. This hypothesis was confirmed. It was hypothesized that schizoid personality would negatively impact social support due to interpersonal difficulties that result in social withdrawal. This was confirmed by the significant, negative association schizoid personality had on social support. In other words, the more schizoid traits an adolescent endorsed, the less likely he was to have different types of support at school or home. It was also hypothesized that social support would decrease substance problems. This hypothesis was not confirmed. That is, for this sample having access to more and different types of support ranging from school counselor to parents did not decrease AOD use. It was hypothesized that schizoid personality would have a positive, direct,growing cannabis indoors and significant effect on substance problems. This was confirmed because higher levels of schizoid traits predicted higher AOD use. Similarly, the hypothesis of trauma having an indirect, positive relationship with substance problems was confirmed. Trauma had an indirect, significant, positive association with substance problems providing evidence for the role of childhood abuse adversely affecting AOD use behaviors in adolescence. This effect was found for the traumaschizoid pathway only but not for the trauma-schizoid-social support pathway. This implies that substance problems share a pathway with trauma and personality. As a consequence, the epidemiology of substance problems should encompass traumatic experiences as well as personality traits. The conceptualization of problematic underage AOD behaviors requires a multifaceted model that accounts for the association between intrapsychic factors and extrapsychic outcomes. This study explored whether social support decreases the association of schizoid personality with substance problems.
In the literature social support in the form of parental support was found to decrease adolescent substance use by instilling healthier coping mechanisms and better self-control . The measure of social support used in this study did not focus on only one type of support but included a variety of sources to which youths have access; i.e., teachers, parents, friends at school, and friends at home as well as hobbies. Assessing different forms of support including instrumental and emotional support, the hypothesis was not confirmed. For individuals with schizoid traits having different sources of social support did not ameliorate the negative trajectories of childhood trauma to substance problems. Particularly, social support did not act as a resilience factor in the trauma-schizoid-substance problems pathway. Over one third of the participants responded to items on the schizoid personality scale indicating that they did not care to be around people, and they did not feel emotional about people. Besides, twice as many reported not trusting most people, wanting to get even, and space out the world. These findings carry implications for counselors, as well as for probation officers, courts, and school personnel. The endorsement of several schizoid items clearly indicates a differentiated personality profile from the antisocial type. This overlooked type presents with a complex affective, cognitive, and behavioral profile that is shaped by past trauma and personality traits that require a special set of interventions. High levels of introversion, mistrust, and emotional detachment are qualitatively different from the emotional coldness of the so-called psychopath . A person with such a profile is likely to have a rich inner life created in an attempt to compensate for failed relationships with caregivers that is not accessed via conventional AOD treatment. Even though early traumatic experiences do not inevitably lead to personality disorders, they impact the way individuals see the world and others. Hence, assessing for personality traits should not be minimized to diagnostics, but serve the need for a greater understanding of the individual client. Research finds that relational trauma between child and caregiver has long-lasting effects on development . Childhood abuse is a risk factor for psychiatric disorders as it impacts the way individuals relate to others and the self . This is because the experience of abuse becomes internalized psychologically and physiologically in the form of brain function . Research on childhood trauma indicates that physical, sexual, and emotional abuse are associated with interpersonal hostility, low self-esteem, inadequate social functioning, and lower use of social coping strategies . From an object relations perspective, schizoid traits are the result of post-natal failures of loving relationships in which a strong sense of self was prevented from unfolding . Copious research has studied the relations trauma has with mental health and antisocial behaviors, such as substance abuse . Giaconia et al. found that as a result of affective, cognitive, and behavioral vulnerabilities trauma survivors are more likely to experience substance problems as well. This pathway was supported by the results of this study. This study also contributed an additional element, i.e., schizoid personality, into the conceptualization of the pathway between trauma and substance use. While schizoid traits in themselves are not pathological, having more of those traits in the context of trauma predicted substance problems. Hence, moving toward the higher end of the schizoid dimension poses a risk factor for problematic AOD use among youths who committed a crime, including trying to hide one’s use, using substances more frequently, and annoying others with their use. Psychoanalytic accounts of schizoid personality state that underneath the expressions of indifference and emotional coldness is a hunger for love and intimacy, a hyper-reflectiveness about the self, and a curiosity about others . This may help to conceptualize the relationship between schizoid traits and substance problems when thinking of AOD use as a way to numb the potentially distressing, unmet needs for interpersonal connectedness. Generally, results suggest that having experienced trauma in childhood is related to emotional detachment and psychological distress. This study was able to demonstrate that the effects of childhood trauma on personality can entail schizoid traits. Moreover, the alternative model demonstrated that when including personality in the model the direct effect between trauma and substance problems became non-significant, therefore providing empirical evidence for subsequent intrapsychic effects of trauma that led to maladjustment and not the occurrence of trauma per se. This corresponds to a resilience framework whereby maladjustment is not an irrevocable result but instead springs from the presence of additional risk factors that may have emerged from the original trauma. This work contributed to the resilience literature by examining the role of social support for different populations and personality types.