Stockholm Syndrome: When the Victim Falls in Love with the Perpetrator
In Stockholm, the capital of Sweden, specifically in 1973, Jan-Erik Olsson carried out a bank robbery at “Kreditbanken” in the city. He held four bank employees hostage, and later, one of his accomplices joined them. After six days of captivity, the hostages appeared to have developed a positive relationship with their captors and showed great sympathy towards them, despite the confinement and violence they experienced. Upon their release, some bank employees refused to testify against the bank robbers in court and even collected money to support their defence.
During a phone call with the Swedish Prime Minister, Olof Palme, one of the hostages mentioned that she fully trusted her captors but feared getting killed in a police raid on the building. This gave rise to the concept of Stockholm Syndrome. The term was coined by the psychiatrist and crime researcher Nils Bejerot to describe this phenomenon, and psychiatrist Frank Ochberg showed interest in the syndrome in the 1970s, defining and explaining it to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the British police force, Scotland Yard.
So, what is Stockholm Syndrome?
Stockholm Syndrome is a psychological response by a victim to violence or captivity. It is a phenomenon that affects individuals when they begin to empathize and cooperate with their enemy or those who have harmed them in one way or another. Over time, the individual develops positive feelings towards the perpetrators or attackers and starts exhibiting behaviours and attitudes of empathy, cooperation, clinging to them, and defending them, while rejecting attempts to break free from their control. Stockholm Syndrome includes other types of trauma where there is a connection between the aggressor and the person being harmed.
领英推荐
Many doctors believe that the positive feelings the victim develops towards the perpetrator are a psychological mechanism of adaptation used to survive days, weeks, or even years of shock or mistreatment.
Full Article: https://mobaderoon.org/abused-women-do-not-want-to-survive-stockholm-syndrome-when-the-victim-loves-her-torturer/
By: Manar Abboud
#Mobaderoon
#StockholmSyndrome #gbv #gender #violence #genderbasedviolence