General public definition
- Vicarious trauma is currently not listed as a diagnosis in either the DSM-5-TR or ICD-11.
- Vicarious trauma is psychological trauma that can occur in people who are indirectly exposed to a potentially psychologically traumatic event (PPTE) (e.g. when providing professional or personal support or care to a traumatized person).
- The term vicarious trauma is often used to describe symptoms experienced by a counsellor or therapist who works with patients or clients who have experienced psychologically traumatic events.
- Vicarious trauma is also known as secondary traumatic stress.
Academic definition
- Vicarious trauma is currently not listed as a diagnosis in either the DSM-5-TR or ICD-11.
- Vicarious trauma refers to psychological trauma that occurs following indirect exposure to a potentially psychologically traumatic event or exposure to a traumatized person (e.g. learning about another’s trauma, or providing professional or personal support or care to a traumatized person).
- Vicarious trauma can be “the transformation that occurs within the therapist as a result of empathic engagement with the client’s trauma experiences and their sequelae.”71
- Vicarious trauma is believed to be exacerbated by, and perhaps rooted in, the open engagement of empathy, or the connection with the client that is inherent in counselling relationships.72,73
- Vicarious trauma reflects exposure of counsellors to their clients’ accounts of traumatic experiences, and encompasses the subsequent cognitive, emotional, and behavioural disruptions experienced by those counsellors.72-74
Back to Glossary of Terms