Unprocessed collective trauma transmits guilt across perpetrator generations

Evidence

According to psychiatrist Vamik Volkan (2001), shared traumatic events that are not worked through—that is,when the loss is not appropriately processed and commemorated—are transmitted transgenerationally, with harmful psychological consequences for members of the traumatized groups. These effects include the descendants of the victim group, who are preoccupied with shared feelings of humiliation, yet they can also extend to members of the perpetrator group, who may be preoccupied with guilt. — Nurit Shnabel and Johannes Ullrich, Identity Needs in Intergroup Relations, 74

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to perpetrator-group guilt, complementing the agentic-vs-moral identity asymmetry framework the reader is building. — connects to: Collectivist self-definition buffers individual distress while amplifying shared family trauma. — Leonard S. Newman and Ralph Erber (eds.), Understanding Genocide: The Social…, 1034

Broader Connections

• Collectivist self-definition buffers individual distress while amplifying shared family trauma. #expands (0.72) — Leonard S. Newman and Ralph Erber (eds.), Understanding Genocide, 1034