Life Adjustment After Severe Persecution
PETER OSTWALD M.D.1, and
EGON BITTNER PH.D.1
1 Department of psychiatry, University of California School of Medicine, and Langley Porter Neuropsychiatric Institute, 401 Parnassus Avenue, San Francisco, Calif. 94122
To study the life adjustment of victims of Nazi persecution and its relationship to their past experiences and psychiatric problems, the authors interviewed and reviewed the case records of 60 persecution victims who had sought or been referred for psychiatric evaluation. They found that the seemingly successful life adjustment attained by most of these individuals was often based on an aggressive and single-minded pursuit of outward signs of success which in fact brought them little satisfaction. This "synecdoche of success" seems to result from a massive threat to existence not only felt in memory but seen as an ever-present reality.
