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 to a particular individual rather than to a broad population where the focus is on “the size of the bang.” What really constitutes an experience of trauma? When does the normative adaptation to adversity that is part of the infant attachment paradigm cross over the line and become attachment trauma? Are there biological considerations in this kind of event or are there only psychodynamic considerations, relational activities? In this brief communication these questions are explored in relation to a multiple self-state psychology of mind that is consistent with Bowlby’s exploration of segregated subsystems, detachment, and deactivation.