'The sleep of reason produces monsters'-psychiatric, medicolegal and psychosocial aspects of child abuse

摘要

The study is based on the principle that the whole spectrum of emotional and physical child abuserepresents a predictive factor regarding the social adaptability of the future generations.The paper presents a correlation between a domestic violence study, and a case study of child abuse.The authors are analyzing, through an extensive review of trauma and psychiatric medico-legalevaluations, the aggressors and the victims-the abused children.The factorial analysis of the exogenous dominant variables identifies, by reporting to stress, two majorcomponents implicated in domestic violence: one component consisting of transcultural particularities ,relationships within the domestic group, and the ways the abuse was committed, and another componentconsisting of the type of domestic group, its quality and types of violence.The case presented confirms the findings in the factorial study, approaching both the psychological andpsychopathological coordinates of the aggressors, and also the modalities used in committing the physical andemotional abuse upon the victims. There were different predictions regarding evolution in time of the socialadaptability of the abused children.Considerations are being made regarding the micro and macro social context of the acts in the sense ofsignaling deficiencies within the system, and the current norms. This may lead to unimaginable consequences (such as the ones in the presented case).