Citation

Glavač T. Kairos 2020; 14(1-2): 129-155.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2020)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

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Abstract

The phenomenon of self-destructiveness has long puzzled scholars and researchers alike. Through a review of the literature our goal was to theoretically explore the field of self-destructive behaviour among clinical and non-clinical populations. We differentiate between behaviour that more frequently occurs among individuals in the non-clinical population (e.g. procrastination, self-handicapping, learned helplessness etc.) and behaviour which is more frequent in the clinical population (self-harm, substance abuse, suicide etc.) The review showed that the factors influencing self-destructive behaviour in otherwise healthy individuals are self-regulation capacity and emotional distress. Among the clinical population trauma in the form of physical abuse, sexual abuse and experiencing violence has been found to be one of the fundamental causes of self-destructive behaviour. Contemporary research has proposed the "experiential avoidance model", a model which understands self-destructiveness as a strategy to mitigate emotional distress. Although differing in severity, self-destructive behaviour among clinical and non-clinical individuals appears to have the same goal of helping the individual manage emotional distress. © 2020 Slovenian Umbrella Association for Psychotherapy. All rights reserved.

Language: sk

Keywords

trauma; self-harm; experiential avoidance model; self-destructive behavior