Chapter 6: Trauma and Restorative Landscapes in Higher Education

Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) entered the American Psychiatric Association’s third edition of its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-III) in 1980. The PTSD diagnosis filled an important gap in psychiatric theory and practice, as it provided a framework to understand how traumatic experiences impact an individual’s sense of identity, memory, learning, emotion, and capacity to connect with and contribute to their community (Goodman & McIntyre, 2017; Klinke et al., 2020; Sellnow et al., 2019). Individuals with PTSD have been exposed to a traumatic event such as rape, physical assault, torture, a motor vehicle accident, or any situation in which they believed that their life was at risk. PTSD is now recognized as a global phenomenon that fundamentally alters an individual’s capacity to feel safe (Michalopoulos et al., 2020). Thirty percent of individuals in war zones will develop PTSD, and approximately 8% of the U.S. population suffers with PTSD (Iribarren et al., 2005).