Clinical Neuropsychiatry Volume 22, issue 5 – October 2025
Special Issue
“Attachment Trauma”
THE PSYCHOPATHOLOGICAL DOMAINS OF ATTACHMENT TRAUMA: A PROPOSAL FOR A CLINICAL CONCEPTUALIZATION
by Benedetto Farina, Adriano Schimmenti Key words: attachment trauma, diagnosis, psychopathology, psychotherapy This article provides a critical review of the concept of attachment trauma, proposing an expanded definition that reflects its psychopathogenic...
Conducting Effective Therapy for Attachment Trauma Requires Skill in Being Human
by Jon G. Allen Key words: attachment, care, mentalizing, trauma, trust Benedetto Farina and Adriano Schimmenti have synthesized the burgeoning literature on attachment trauma to draw attention to its prevalence and pervasive role in the development of...
Attachment Trauma Re-viewed: A Commentary on Farina and Schimmenti (2025a)
by Ken Benau, Onno van der Hart Key words: attachment trauma, disorganized attachment, traumatic disintegration, dissociation, psychotherapy Farina and Schimmenti (2025a) have made a major contribution to furthering our understanding of early developmental...
Some Additional Curiosity About When Adaptation to Developmental Adversity Becomes a Trauma
by Richard A. Chefetz Key words: trauma, infant attachment, self-state The concept of attachment trauma is provocative and stimulates an effort to seek additional definitions of trauma that are more congenial toward understanding the mental injury occurring...
THE PSYCHOPATHOLOGICAL DOMAINS OF ATTACHMENT TRAUMA: A COMMENTARY
by Frank M. Corrigan and Hannah Young Key words: attachment trauma, childhood maltreatment; Deep Brain Reorienting (DBR) The contribution by Farina & Schimmenti (2025) highlights the impact of childhood maltreatment on adult health. Deep Brain Reorienting...
Diagnostic Inclusion of Attachment Trauma: A Commentary on Farina and Schimmenti (2025)
by Constance J. Dalenberg, Kenneth J. Thompson Key words: assessment, attachment trauma, diagnosis, trauma-informed case formulation Farina and Schimmenti (2025) offer an intriguing reconceptualization of attachment trauma as a developmental process arising...
Inferring attachment trauma from clinical symptoms and dynamics: A challenge for scientists, a gift for therapists and their patients
by Martin J. Dorahy Key words: attachment trauma, inference, therapist factors, patient factors Farina and Schimmenti bring together a wealth of research data and clinical experience to link the attachment trauma literature with specific symptoms and...
Conceptualizing Attachment Trauma: A Developmental Trauma Perspective
by Julian D. Ford Key words: adult, attachment, child, developmental trauma, emotion regulation Attachment trauma, as cogently formulated by Farina and Schimmenti (2025), involves traumatic experiences that fundamentally disrupt attachment bonding with...
Attachment trauma and its legacies across development: A clinical commentary
by Ana M. Gomez and Jillian Hosey Key words: children, clinical interventions, co-regulation, psychotherapy, relational repair This commentary offers a critical and appreciative examination of Farina and Schimmenti’s contribution to the understanding...
Overcoming the Brain-Body Disconnect Following Attachment Trauma: A Comment on Farina and Schimmenti
by Ruth A. Lanius Key words: adult, attachment, child, developmental trauma, emotion regulation Farina and Schimmenti’s (2025) model of Attachment Trauma (AT) reframes early relational adversity as a transdiagnostic, developmentally rooted process that...
Attachment trauma and its psychopathological domains through the neuropsychodynamic model of self and trauma
by Andrea Scalabrini, Clara Mucci Key words: attachment trauma, dissociation, embodied witnessing, early relational trauma, nested hierarchical model of self Farina and Schimmenti’s model of attachment trauma offers a robust, transdiagnostic framework...
Grasping and treating attachment trauma: A work in progress
by Ellert R.S. Nijenhuis Key words: attachment trauma, child maltreatment, dissociation, ecosystems, motivation Farina and Schimmenti detail and define the potential consequences for their health when children meet and cannot escape from primary caretakers...
FROM ATTACHMENT TRAUMA TO TRAUMATIC ATTACHMENT: INVISIBLE INJURIES OF EARLY CHILDHOOD AND SUBTLE RELATIONAL CODES OF SELF-REGULATION
by Vedat Şar Key words: attachment trauma, encryption vulnerability, internal moderation, implicit psychotherapy, dialectic dynamic therapy Building on recent contributions by Farina and Schimmenti (2025a), this paper advances a more nuanced framework...
Attachment Trauma: What has been missing in trauma treatment
by Roger Solomon Key words: attachment, attachment trauma, traumatic attachment to the perpetrator This article offers commentary on the featured article on attachment trauma by Farina and Schimmenti (2025). Attachment trauma is often not recognized by...
Traumatic developments: Towards an increasingly integrated conceptualization
by Maria Paola Boldrini, Giovanni Tagliavini Key words: attachment trauma, psychological trauma, psychotherapy Farina and Schimmenti’s proposal, which directs attention in the field of complex trauma treatment toward the central role of attachment trauma...