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Trauma and Sexuality: The Effects Childhood Sexual, Physical, and Emotional Abuse on Sexual Identity and Behaviour.

Editors: James A. Chu & Elizabeth S. Bowman.

CRC Press. 2003.

ISBN: 9780789020437.

Trauma and Sexuality is an edited scholarly volume examining how different forms of childhood abuse affect adult sexual identity, orientation, behaviour, and clinical presentation, aimed primarily at clinicians working with trauma survivors. Clinically, the volume Treats unusual or distressing sexual patterns as understandable adaptations rather than moral failings; encourages attention to gender, orientation, and identity issues, particularly in dissociative and LGBTQ+ populations; and stresses the need for informed, affirming care when trauma and sexuality intersect.

James A. Chu, MD, is an American psychiatrist known internationally for his work on the post-traumatic effects of childhood abuse, complex PTSD, and dissociative disorders. He studied at Yale College and then received his MD from Tufts University School of Medicine in 1976. He served as Assistant Professor (later Associate Clinical Professor) of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and as Senior Psychiatrist and Director of the Dissociative Disorders Program at McLean Hospital, eventually becoming Chief of Clinical Services. He has been a Fellow, past President, and awardee (Cornelia B. Wilbur and Distinguished Achievement Awards) of the International Society for the Study of Trauma and Dissociation (ISSTD), reflecting his standing in the dissociation field.

Elizabeth S. Bowman, MD, is a psychiatrist whose scholarly work focuses on trauma, dissociation, and controversies around the diagnosis and conceptualization of dissociative disorders.

Her work appears in journals like Journal of Trauma & Dissociation and in debates on “structural dissociation,” where she has co-authored pieces with Etzel Cardeña and colleagues on how dissociation should be defined and operationalized.

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