The Level of Personality Organization and Revictimization in Lives of Child Sexual Abuse Survivors

Abstract

Previous research has documented that women who were sexually abused in childhood are also often victims of sexual abuse in adulthood. In the current study, we investigated the relationship between the phenomenon of sexual revictimization and personality organization (PO) conceptualized in accordance with the Otto Kernberg’s theory. The central hypothesis was that women with borderline personality organization (BPO) and neurotic personality organization (NPO) differ in terms of the occurrence of revictimization and its features. We predicted that women with BPO would experience revictimization more often, and that it would be characterized by features determining its higher severity than in women with NPO. In our study, 119 Polish adult women completed measures of PO and experiences of sexual violence in childhood and adulthood. The results supported the predicted relationships. After controlling for participants’ age, we showed that women with a close to borderline level of personality organization (cBPO) are at the greater risk of experiencing revictimization than those with NPO, in particular the revictimization involving penetration and by the previously known offender. Moreover, specific structural features related to BPO were found to have particular associations: Fear of Fusion (FF) was associated with the experience of revictimization; Identity Diffusion (ID), Primitive Defense Mechanism (PDM), FF, and Impaired Reality Testing (IRT) with penetration during revictimization; and PDM and IRT with revictimization by the previously known offender. Our findings suggest the importance of taking into account PO in estimating the risk of revictimization, as well as in therapy programs aimed at reducing this risk.