One reason is because there are several different names used interchangeably to refer to the same kind of abuse, including emotional abuse/violence, psychological abuse/violence, and mental abuse.
What is another name for mental or emotional abuse is mental?
Psychological or mental abuse is typically characterized by distorting someone's sense of reality. This is also called gaslighting. The goal of the psychological abuser is to convince the victim that they are crazy or incompetent.
Emotional abuse can involve any of the following: Verbal abuse: yelling at you, insulting you or swearing at you. Rejection: constantly rejecting your thoughts, ideas and opinions. Gaslighting: making you doubt your own feelings and thoughts, and even your sanity, by manipulating the truth.
Verbal abuse is the most common form of emotional abuse. Things may be said in a loving, quiet voice, or be indirect—even concealed as a joke. Confronting an abuser often takes the support and validation of a group, therapist, or counselor.
Reviewed by Psychology Today Staff. Emotional abuse is a pattern of behavior in which the perpetrator insults, humiliates, and generally instills fear in an individual in order to control them. The individual's reality may become distorted as they internalize the abuse as their own failings.
The term describes a type of emotional abuse that comes from a person with narcissistic personality disorder (NPD). People with NPD have low empathy and see others as beneath them, which can lead to harmful, toxic, abusive behaviors. Narcissistic abuse can be incredibly difficult to endure.
Emotional, or psychological, trauma is the result of traumatizing experiences that leave you feeling unsafe or helpless. Some trauma may also cause physical harm, such as a car accident or assault, but you do not have to sustain a physical injury to experience emotional trauma.
Emotional abuse can lead to C-PTSD, a type of PTSD that involves ongoing trauma. C-PTSD shows many of the same symptoms as PTSD, although its symptoms and causes can differ. Treatment should be tailored to the situation to address the ongoing trauma the person experienced from emotional abuse.
What are the effects of emotional or verbal abuse? Staying in an emotionally or verbally abusive relationship can have long-lasting effects on your physical and mental health, including leading to chronic pain, depression, or anxiety.
The four stages of the narcissistic abuse cycle are: Idealization, Devaluation, Repetition, and Discard. In this cycle, a narcissistic partner may love-bomb you, devalue your sense of self over time, repeat the pattern, and eventually, discard you and/or the relationship.
The cycle of abuse is made up of four stages. These stages include the building of tension, the abuse incident, the reconciliation, and a period of calm.
You may experience feelings of confusion, anxiety, shame, guilt, frequent crying, over-compliance, powerlessness, and more. You may stay in the relationship and try to bargain with the abuser or try to change the abuser's behavior, often placing blame on yourself, even though you are not at fault.
We now understand that emotional abuse can cause a subcategory of the mental health condition PTSD, known as complex post-traumatic stress disorder (C-PTSD). It's actually one of the most severe forms of PTSD. Emotional abuse can cause both long- and short-term effects on mental (and physical) health.
