Giftedness,Trauma,and Development

Abstract

A qualitative, longitudinal, phenomenological case study explored how a gifted female experienced various life events and aspects of development during adolescence and young adulthood (ages 15–30 years), particularly as related to multiple traumatic experiences, which were revealed late in the first year of the study. Additional experiences, well into young adulthood, appear to have been precipitated by posttrauma phenomena, among them a sense of powerlessness, a need for control, extreme and confusing emotions and behaviors, disordered eating, and sensitivity to others’ responses. The control concern was manifested in a pervasive “sense of urgency,” which contributed to decisions that had particular impact on her development. Special attention is given to the intersection of giftedness and adversity, with reference to characteristics associated with giftedness. Method and findings begin to fill multiple gaps in the giftedness literature, but findings are generally supported by existing literature related to trauma and protective factors.

Keywords

case study gifted development trauma longitudinal qualitative

This longitudinal research case study began with the purpose of exploring an extraordinary female adolescent’s lived experience of development in authentic contexts. Although important for examining development over time (Rice, 1992), such studies are not common, especially when exceptional ability is a major focus and when the method is entirely qualitative. In addition, with only rare exceptions (e.g., Freeman, 2006), social and emotional development and high ability have typically not been studied together longitudinally and qualitatively. In general, studies have not illuminated the complexity of the experience of development, including—and perhaps especially—for individuals who fit positive stereotypes related to giftedness and achievement. This study was intended to address these gaps.

For an out-of-state workshop I conducted, a gifted education teacher had invited a young woman named Michelle (pseudonym) to be among several gifted teenagers helping me demonstrate a small-group discussion of social and emotional development. I had requested dissimilar personalities, backgrounds, and achievement levels, and the teacher said she had chosen this student because she was “amazing, outstanding.” From the outset of the demonstration, her articulateness, composure, striking physical presence, and insights set her apart. Later, I was surprised to learn that she was not yet 15, 2–3 years younger than others in the group. Curious about how she would experience the next several years, and recognizing an opportunity to study the social, emotional, and career development of an exceptional individual, I formally arranged to follow her development from a distance. I was surprised, near the end of the first year, when her second handwritten letter revealed sexual and other physical abuse, family violence, an eating disorder, and depression. The purpose of the study did not change then; however, the focus shifted to how she experienced the intersection of giftedness and trauma, including how it related to development. That change allowed another gap in the literature to be addressed: qualitative, longitudinal exploration of exceptional ability in difficult circumstances. I followed her development for 15 years, with the goal of deep understanding of her in context.

The central phenomenon, the asset-burden paradox of giftedness, has been presented elsewhere (Peterson, 2012). Intellectual ability helped her develop strategies for coping with childhood sexual abuse (CSA) and other traumatic experiences, make sense of experiences, and learn to self-regulate in response to posttraumatic stress. Burdens were related to her own and others’ heavy expectations of her, others’ negative responses to her abilities, and others’ lack of recognition or acknowledgment of her distress.

Sensitizing Concepts

I approached the study as naturalistic inquiry, entering “with relatively little advance conceptualization . . . open to whatever becomes salient to pursue” (Patton, 2002, p. 194). An “emergent and flexible” design (Patton, 2002, p. 194) accommodated the later shift in focus. In open-ended exploration, instead of being guided by hypotheses and other preconceptions, a “sensitizing concept” can orient researchers initially (Patton, 2002, p. 278). At the outset of this study, characteristics associated with giftedness (e.g., intensity; Daniels & Piechowski, 2009) were among sensitizing concepts, helping me consider what I might observe during a complex experience. Mendaglio (1995) had argued that the rapid information processing associated with giftedness contributes to heightened sensitivity to environmental stimuli, with impact on emotions. The related concept of intellectual, sensual, emotional, imaginational, and psychomotor overexcitabilities (OEs; Dabrowski, 1970) was also explored. Piechowski (2014) entitled a pertinent chapter “Excitable, Spirited, Very Alive,” and referred to “personal energy” and “intellectual and emotional aliveness” (pp. 22–23). Intense feelings and interests, as well as tension, frustrations, and being “a highly sensitive person” (Piechowski, 2014, p. 36) can reflect OEs. Literature associating high ability with childhood struggles with existential questions about personal meaning and human values (Webb, Meckstroth, & Tolan, 1982) was also of interest. Each of these phenomena had been evident, to some extent, in the participant’s comments during the demonstration group. When she revealed abuse several months after the study began, CSA and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) literature became salient, and a formal review of these literatures occurred eventually.

Appropriate for the presentation of qualitative research, in which emerging themes prompt examination of additional pertinent literature, the concepts introduced above will be discussed further in the “Discussion” section. However, because PTSD will be referenced during the presentation of findings, it is briefly introduced here as intrusion, emotional numbing, hypervigilance, avoidance of reminders, and increased arousal and reactivity, among several likely responses to a traumatic event (American Psychiatric Association, 2013.

It should be noted that the study was not driven by diagnostic criteria or assumptions about trauma, and it was not conducted as a clinical study. The participant appeared to engage in the study with a need to understand and make sense, not to adjust or change. The focus remained on her own retrospective perceptions of her experiences. Van Manen (1990) explained that “phenomenological reflection is not introspective but retrospective . . . reflection on experience that is already passed or lived through” (pp. 9–10).

Method

The Participant: Context and Chronology

As a child and adolescent, Michelle lived in a small Southern town. Her brother was 2 years older, and her sister was 10 years younger. During her early childhood, comments about her intellectual ability contributed to a sense of being different from her peers. Other factors added to that sense of self. Her mother’s extended family, living in that area, were respected and middle class, but in that mostly Baptist town they were Catholic, not considered to be Christian there (“separating me from peers early”). Her father was non-Christian, an immigrant from the Middle East. His cultural heritage was not acknowledged or embraced in the home, and she did not meet members of his family of origin until many years later. In addition, being told “you’re lucky you look White” implied a lack of respect for her paternal heritage.

However, other early experiences helped counter these negative messages. Her mother felt inadequate parenting an incessantly questioning child, but her father lauded Michelle’s strengths, discussed world news with her even when she was in kindergarten, and envisioned a positive future for her. She was identified as gifted early in school, participated in a program for gifted children, and had steady support from teachers. She felt comfortable within the inherent structure of school life. Peers communicated admiration, and she felt competent, but she felt burdened by her own and others’ expectations.

At home, she witnessed extreme domestic conflict and physical abuse, and, as a young adult, she had vague early childhood memories of inappropriate, sexualized touch by a babysitter. Other home factors also affected her sense of self. Her position in the family was paradoxical: “content to sit still and watch, but also the most challenging. If it was on my mind, I said it. I challenged the hypocrisy, ethics, morals—bringing my mom to tears. She said I gave her a headache.” Yet, her adult-like abilities also contributed to her becoming her mother’s confidante: “She treated me as her best friend—talked about my dad, that he was a terrible man.” Besides the effect on her relationship with her father, Michelle’s self-esteem was affected: “It’s hard to love yourself when I was most like him. My thinking self was especially burdened, the gift he had given me.” When she matured early physically and had boyfriends, he became physically abusive, including humiliating her by hitting her in public. Nevertheless, during eighth grade, she was student council president, a high-profile cheerleader, and an academically successful student.

During her early adolescence, her parents divorced, and she experienced 2 years of bulimia and sibling incest, beginning at age 12. In Grade 10, she confided in the school counselor, who broke confidentiality by telling a colleague (ostensibly, according to Michelle, “as ‘help’”), who told others. That breach led to Michelle’s being ostracized at school and at home. She wanted to leave school and town, but the principal and her mother “saw my attempt to flee as naïve.” A lost-credit situation strengthened her resolve. She had been allowed to be a teacher assistant as a sophomore instead of taking a class, and when she dropped cheerleading, she lacked enough credits to move up with her class the next year. No recourse was offered her. She asked for legal advice from a lawyer who had heard her speak at a banquet and had offered assistance if ever needed. She had learned that support would need to come, in her words, “from the outside.” Her subsequent decision to leave distressed school personnel, who worried about the effect on peers.

She passed the GED® Test and began college at a regional university the next summer. By then she was in a relationship with a rebellious boyfriend, a few years older, and together they were angry at institutions. However, his abuse and possessiveness led her to leave him after 4 years. During college, she experienced depression, lacked motivation, sought counseling, and eventually dropped out for a semester. When she returned, she joined an extracurricular activity that brought her into contact with others with high ability. She excelled, but also was harassed with aggressive sexual comments.

At 22, she completed a master’s degree and married a college senior whose exceptional abilities matched hers and who had a calming influence. However, during that year she advocated publicly for a student who had been raped by a professor—and became a scapegoat, discredited by the latter, who was aware of her childhood experiences. She and her husband then moved far away to a community college teaching position for her and a master’s degree program for him. Their daughter was born there. A year later, they relocated to the city where her father was then living, not far from her hometown. She taught in a high school and at two area colleges over the next 3 years, and their son was born there. Subsequently, at 28, her decision to divorce her parents (“a symbolic death”) to distance herself and her children, ages 2 and 6, from troubling family dynamics coincided with new university positions for her and her husband—again in a city far away. They were living there at the end of the study. Michelle appeared to have survived a turbulent childhood, adolescence, and young adulthood. Table 1 offers a chronological summary of her development.

Table 1.

Chronology of Participant’s Development, Life Events, and Positive and Negative Impact.

Moving through development	Positive developmental impact	Negative developmental impact	Negative life events
Ages 2–11: A mixed foundation for later
			Later: Memory of molestation by babysitter
	Father’s talking; positive expectations of her	Mixed maternal messages: Real vs. unreal	Physical abuse of self and sibling by father
Easy school adjustment	Sunday school teacher		Inappropriate sex play
Serious student	Helps in aunt’s campaign	Father’s heritage not affirmed by mother	Parental discord; confidante role

Ages 12–15: An envied presence, extreme investment, and blame
Ages 12–13
Early boyfriends	Student leader, officer	Real vs. unreal confusion	Brother incest
Serious student		Sense of being “too much”	Public beating by father
			Violence, emotional abuse
			Mother negative re: Father
			Mother: Not protective
Ages 14–15
	Student leader	Bulimia	Divorce: “Your fault”
	Lawyer offers help	Loss of trust in school	Breached confidentiality
	Social services involved	Peer/family ostracism
Better: Real vs. unreal	Brother validates abuse		Family denies abuse

Ages 16–17: “The system”
	Boyfriend’s mother	Depression; suicidal	Drops cheerleading, ½ credit
Drops out of school	Consultation with lawyer	Usual peer contact gone	Sudden grade demotion
Serious relationship	Boyfriend channels anger	Isolation
Employed by school	Distancing from family
Angry autonomy	Supportive employers
Enters university	Relative facilitates loan		No home financial support

Ages 18–23: Troubled autonomy; finding a focus
Ages 18–19
Drops out of college		Low motivation, focus	E-mail stalker at college
Developmentally stuck		Uncomfortable socially	Boyfriend isolates, abuses

Ages 20–21
Breaks up with boyfriend		“Real?” issue reappears	Possessions burned
Resumes college; finds good-fit environment	Female professors offer support after harassment	Intense anger at mother’s earlier lack of protection	Sexually harassed by graduate assistant

Ages 22–23
Graduates from college; enters graduate school	Father speaks to class; she embraces heritage	Intense anger at mother
Marries friend/classmate	Advocacy for rape victim		Discredited as advocate
Master’s degree (1 year)	Husband: Calm support
Professional position

Ages 24–30: Moving away, moving back, moving ahead, gifts at work
Daughter born		Intense anger at mother	Medical leave; grievance
Moves near to father	Success as teacher		Uncomfortable with father
Teacher identity	Confident parenting
Son born	Good fit in environment	Divorces parents
New job, far away	Tentative mother contact

Note. Boldface indicates significant developmental accomplishment.

Procedures

Data gathering

After securing assent from Michelle (then 15), consent from her mother, and approval from the university review board, I invited Michelle to participate: “Whenever you feel like it, just write and let me know how your life is going.” She did that, writing whenever she wanted to share experiences and insights, sometimes frequently for a week and then returning to less regular contact. By the second year, communication from a distance was by e-mail. A full-day face-to-face meeting occurred in Years 4, 6, and 8 of the study; a block of 4 days in Year 9; 2 days the next year; and annual 1- or 2-day meetings during the final 5 years, totaling approximately 130 hours. Because my typing speed matched her moderate speaking rate, I was able to record her thoughts simultaneously on a laptop computer, allowing me to check accuracy of wording, sequences, and roles of individuals as needed. Both of us were aware that the shared information was sensitive, and therefore the process was undertaken carefully and collaboratively. Michelle’s comments during meals or within-city travel were handwritten or tape-recorded, to be transcribed later and sometimes e-mailed to her to be checked for accuracy.

All of these meetings were interactions rather than interviews. I arrived with no prepared questions. Michelle shaped each interaction, always arriving with perspectives to share and to explore. During and after meetings, I made handwritten field notes, self-reflecting about my own experience and role, recording observations, and noting current and former patterns. I typed these later, often gaining additional insights in that process.

During Year 8, I had access to multiple other sources to corroborate Michelle’s perspectives. I was able to arrange unstructured face-to-face interviews with the gifted education teacher (who discussed Michelle’s precocious thinking ability and leadership and, in general terms, her difficult life), a former employer (who appreciated Michelle’s intelligence and work ethic), three graduate student peers (who were interviewed as a group and then observed as they interacted with Michelle later), her husband (who was aware of her struggles), her mother (who described aspects of Michelle’s adolescence, including a period of suicidal ideation), and her sister (who communicated respect for big-sister Michelle and awareness of family tensions). These interviews were 20 to 60 min in length, with simultaneous laptop typing and with frequent member checking for accuracy. The initial question was some version of “What should I understand about Michelle?” There were few surprises, perhaps because of her straightforward, self-critical self-appraisals over a long period of time, including discussions about relationships with these individuals. However, confirmation of aspects of personality and relationships was helpful.

During that same trip, her mother gave me journals from adolescence (ages 14–16), school essays, and school records. Michelle had frequently spoken and written harshly about her mother’s lack of protection from the abuse, but later acknowledged that her mother had recognized the importance of these materials and had been generous in giving them to me.

After the first manuscript on the study was completed in Year 10, Michelle expressed concern that family members and others with negative roles in her life could be harmed, even if not named. She asked to discontinue the study, and I respected her request. Several months later, she suggested that we continue the study, and we did, for 5 more years, through her 20s.

Researcher as participant-observer

I am a professional counselor and counselor educator, but my role here was researcher. Nevertheless, I applied engrained counseling skills and tenets orally and in writing. For example, I respected and protected Michelle’s autonomy by avoiding questions with implicit direction. I set clear boundaries and avoided imposing values, giving advice, or “rescuing” her from discomfort. Trained to value the process of development, I was not invested in any particular product or outcome. However, I continually observed her mental health and noted early that she sought counseling and other resources when needed. In regard to my professional responsibilities, I was not aware of her earlier, sustained suicidal ideation until her mother mentioned it and I subsequently read the journals, and sexual abuse had stopped and been reported before her first letter. Mandated family counseling had occurred after social services became involved. Throughout the study, Michelle typically communicated with me after a stressful time, during which she had sought counseling.

Data analysis

Because the fundamental purpose of the study was to explore how a gifted individual experienced development, the emphasis was largely on Michelle’s own sense-making process, articulated orally or in writing, and much less on researcher interpretation. When analyzing data from this information-rich case study, I was guided by Patton (2002). I used inductive (i.e., immersion in details, alert to patterns and themes), holistic (i.e., focused on “complex interdependencies and system dynamics”; Patton, 2002, p. 41), and phenomenological (i.e., focused on “the meaning, structure, and essence of the lived experience,” p. 132) methods when examining data from interactions, interviews, field notes, and artifacts. I viewed the case “as an idiosyncratic manifestation of the phenomenon of interest” (p. 450), with the goal of analyzing and interpreting “thick description . . . detail, context, emotion, and the webs of social relationships that join persons to one another” (Denzin, 1989, p. 83).

Applying the constant-comparative methodology of Glaser and Strauss (1967), I analyzed the accumulated data before the study was stopped temporarily, first with open coding, with potential categories of language units emerging relatively quickly from the narrative data (e.g., intelligence, talents, identity, direction, autonomy, peer relationships, family relationships, school milieu, supportive resources, self-harm, mental health, extreme emotions, action, leadership). Axial coding came next, facilitated by color-coding phrases according to emerging themes (e.g., vulnerability to harm, troubled relationships, failure of institutions and individuals to protect, need for control, proactive behaviors, effects on development). Language units and unit clusters were continually reassessed for fit during both levels of coding. Five years later, during the same processes with new data, several categories and themes emerged again (e.g., difficult peer and family relationships, vulnerability, need for control, effects on development). Some were new or had been articulated in a new way (e.g., sense of urgency, being able to feel emotions), and some had appeared for several months and then were no longer mentioned (e.g., self-harm, eating problems).

I then shared the voluminous collection of letters, e-mails, and conversation data with a respected scholar with expertise in the emotional development of gifted individuals and in qualitative research. He served as a second reader and coder. He examined these data thoroughly, particularly attending to how the aftermath of trauma was experienced. During a subsequent meeting, he validated my coding, and we reached consensus about major underlying patterns. First was the asset-burden paradox of giftedness (Peterson, 2012), especially as related to the interaction of giftedness and posttrauma challenges. OEs had propelled Michelle forward; cognitive strengths had been applied in sense-making and action; and intelligence was an important aspect of her resilience. In addition, her experiences reflected positive disintegration (Dabrowski, 1970; Dabrowski & Piechowski, 1977), a theory related to giftedness that had not been a sensitizing concept at the outset of the study. Second was the impact of unresolved CSA, reflected in the themes of powerlessness, control, extreme behaviors and confusing emotions, disordered eating, sensitivity to others’ responses, and lack of protection. After we determined that the sense of urgency was an underlying pattern (Glaser, 2000), selective coding (Creswell, 1998) was used, with particular attention to effects of urgency on development. The urge to gain control of uncomfortable emotions led to action, with impact on development.

Findings

Besides the sexual abuse from ages 12 to 14, other experiences were unsettling: physical and emotional violence at home, humiliation and ostracism after the breach of confidentiality, her family’s public invalidation of the abuse, dramatically altered peer relationships when held back from Grade 11, physical abuse by a long-term boyfriend after leaving home, his giving away or burning her personal possessions after she left him, sexual harassment in college, being scrutinized herself after advocating for a rape victim, and hostile colleagues’ responses during her troubled pregnancy. The focus here is on Michelle’s response to these and then on their impact on development. After a discussion of the themes related to unresolved CSA, attention will move to development. The low-inference presentation of findings reflects her increasing ability to self-reflect, interpret, find meaning, and articulate her thoughts.

Response to Trauma

Powerlessness, lack of control

Direct and indirect references to power and control were scattered throughout Michelle’s high school journal. She once listed writing, keeping her space clean, and keeping herself clean and neat as helping her feel in control. As an adult, she explained that her efforts and extreme standards were “for my parents” (“nothing seems to be enough”), but were also a response to the emotional pain of violence and abuse. During Grade 11, she wrote about multiple negative changes, including poor grades, absences, and inability to concentrate. Just before leaving school that year, she referred to feeling “hopeless” and “powerless.” During her second year of college, she recognized, “when my boundaries are violated, I shut down.”

Extreme behaviors

Another theme was extreme behavior. During adolescence, obsessive physical exercise and dieting represented attempts at control. When a peer complimented her, Michelle said, “You don’t know how much effort goes into what I look like.” An extreme leader, she took control of the high-profile cheerleading squad. Later, she was alert to victimization in others and, as a teacher, “rescued” (i.e., with problem-solving attention) students in her classes.

Intense, confusing emotions

Her journal entries also reflected deeply troubling emotions. In Grade 9, she wrote, “So much hurts,” and, in Grade 10, “I feel frustrated and insecure and sad and guilty, but of what, I do not know. I’m fixing to binge and want to throw up again. I feel so fat and scared today.” She also wrote of being “afraid to be touched.” Her entries referred to punishment, body hatred, and despair. At 15 she wrote, “What awful thing did I do? I feel so gross . . . I’m tired of hurting myself.” Later that year, she was suicidal: “All weekend I’ve thought about suicide. I just can’t live here anymore. I wish I could cut myself up piece by piece. Tomorrow I’ll go to school and look perfect once again. I HATE SCHOOL.” Her mother said, “Before dropping out, she couldn’t get out of bed, had given things away, which alerted people at school.”

Disordered eating

Michelle’s adolescent journals referred to bulimia regularly over many months, often including rules about food. Late in college, she looked back on the disorder:

It had a lot to do with being violated. I had no privacy, no space, nothing that was mine. Bulimia was mine. It doesn’t feel “in control” now, but might have at the time. I was physically weak after the purge, but it was also a kind of drugged high, satisfied and withdrawn . . . Now I talk to myself about what’s going on . . . feeling infringed upon.

She gained perspective in graduate school: “The eating disorder is sort of like identity politics. I was being violated, and I therefore violated my body.” She would continue to be tempted under stress: “I wanted my eating disorder when the situation happened with [the rape victim].” However, she commented less and less about eating, with no mention during the final 5 years.

Sensitivity to others’ responses

Michelle once underscored the emotional impact of others’ responses, which actually generated the most narrative: “Most everyone important to me acted as if I was overreacting, like my emotions were unwarranted.” With her community insensitive, her experiences invalidated, her expressed needs discounted, her physical presentation and young age interfering with respect for her intellect early in college (“I don’t feel like they take me seriously”), and being confused by sexual harassment, she became hypersensitive to being misperceived.

The abuse itself was confusing. She and her brother were a significant sibling subsystem in a violent family, close in age. She learned he had been sexually abused twice as a child, and she was concerned he would commit suicide. His validation of her experiences was important: “He let me process it the way I needed to.” Nevertheless, just before she left home, she wrote in her journal, “I hate him. He makes me sick. It was not my fault. That isn’t how brothers treat sisters.” At 22, she wrote, “The forgiveness came last summer. Surreal that we’ve experienced the same things about it.”

In her late 20s, she realized she had had symptoms of PTSD already at age 8. The exercise disorder began at 12. After the sexual abuse ended, depression and digestion problems were diagnosed. Then came the breach of confidentiality: “At that point it became public knowledge. People avoided me. When my family denied everything, I was perceived to be a liar, unstable.”

When Michelle first saw an “outside counselor” at 14, a comfortable and productive experience, she had not yet called her experience “sexual abuse.” She was given books: “I kept saying the words—molest, sexual abuse, incest—to myself.” This counselor said “to dissociate myself—when I lived in the house and had no other outlet.” In addition, the counselor “didn’t dumb it down.” Michelle’s next counseling experience was also helpful: “He said it was my misfortune to be stuck in a bad situation, but when I was an adult, I’d be just fine.” However, she described a subsequent experience as negative. A psychologist viewed her persistent fears as schizophrenia and “also said did I know [sic] that at college I’d find people who were smarter than me.” She refused a referral to a psychiatrist and did not return.

She generally sought counseling when feeling unsettled or when experiencing depression or symptoms of PTSD. In all three locations after leaving her home state, she viewed her experiences with traditional and alternative counselors positively. In the first, she gained clarity about her professional context. In the second, she sorted out her relationship with her parents and eventually ceased contact. In the third, she found a women’s group with creative, like-minded explorers.

Her mother told me that she knew the study was important for Michelle. In spite of geographical distance, it was a place to “talk,” through writing, without fear of judgment. In addition, findings provided perspectives to which Michelle could respond:

When I read your first manuscript, I had an awareness of the extent of the trauma and that the system, not just my family, had failed. I really have to heal that now. I have to accept that it was because people weren’t doing what they should’ve been doing—respecting boundaries.

Lack of protection

Pertinent to gaps in or inappropriate behaviors in adults, much of Michelle’s anger related to the abuse remained focused on her mother, who had been informed about it directly, but had not protected her. For most of the study, Michelle was harshly judgmental, as reflected in an e-mail during late adolescence: “Mom sees me as powerful, capable, someone who could bear the brunt. The community felt sorry for her—how could her daughter make up all these things?” Michelle believed her own needs had been discounted: “[Brother] got counseling early . . . I was still functioning at school. I had to plead for and then demand outside help.” She commented about her mother’s response to the depression: “When I withdrew, she . . . said I needed to learn how to be alone.” Later, about her boyfriend, she wrote, “I showed Mom bruises. She didn’t say I should leave. Her face communicated that I deserved it.”

Accomplishing Developmental Tasks

By the end of the study, Michelle appeared to have accomplished major developmental tasks related to identity, career direction, peer connections, a mature relationship, autonomy, and emotional differentiation within and from her family of origin. However, trauma had had impact on all of these areas, making progress uneven and the process a struggle at times. Michelle called the most problematic aspect a “sense of urgency,” which propelled her to act—to calm a frantic need to control distressing situations and disorienting emotions. Sometimes the results of her actions were beneficial for her; sometimes they were not. Periodically, she spoke of being “ready to be done, to move on.” Sometimes she made a bold move. Sometimes inaction coincided with depression.

Identity development

Some early childhood experiences helped Michelle develop confidence and competence, both of these likely contributing to resilience later. As a child, helping her aunt with a political campaign gave her a model for leadership. Her father celebrated her strengths; however, his later physical violence and the ostracism at school challenged these “special” aspects of her identity. In general, wherever she lived, peers viewed her as bright, articulate, competent, and beautiful. However, after entering college, she sensed that these aspects encouraged some in authority to be harshly critical. Finding intellectual peers later, after returning to college, finally made intelligence “safe.” Coursework provoked reflection and proaction: “Learning about identity politics and queer theory helped me understand ‘reality’ and ‘identity’ better. I began experimenting with my identity in an effort to better understand my reality.”

A stable marriage and being comfortable as a parent helped her to incorporate partner and capable parent into her self-assessment. She had been concerned about having had poor parent models, but when her family accompanied her to our meetings late in the study, I observed that her parenting was warm, calm, and direct. Especially after she became a parent, her e-mail messages often included insights about her family of origin.

Some insights were about her relationship with her father. Because of his physical and emotional abuse during her adolescence and her mother’s views of him, she feared him. However, a university listening-skills class changed her perspective: “I could accept that he couldn’t hear me, and his [critical] comments didn’t have to do with me. I changed the way I communicated with him.” As a result, she learned about his childhood and invited him to speak to a class she taught during graduate school—about his experiences as a young adult immigrant, arriving with no knowledge of English. As a result, colleagues and students talked with her about her heritage. She recognized that he, like herself, was “a stubborn, resilient person.” Later, living near him, her identity development took another step: “It’s only in the last 2 years I’ve been able to talk about where I’m from. Now, it’s who I am. Gives me so much [to draw from].” Even after she ceased contact with her father in her mid-20s, she credited him with giving her tools to “participate in the system, in spite of being damaged by it.”

She recognized his impact in other areas as well:

[He had] painted a picture of my capability, my intelligence, my love of books . . . enabled me to choose [husband], created a dream about what my life could be. The important thing is he was talking with me [as a young child].

As the study ended, she was comfortable with her strengths and was applying them appropriately. However, she knew she would need to self-monitor carefully to avoid potentially derailing progress with “urgent” responses—for example, deciding, changing, rescuing, defending, and leaving. In retrospect, although these behaviors fit her leader identity and initially made sense in negative situations, she recognized patterns and risks related especially to career development.

Career development

Her junior high leadership experiences had given her a vision of the future (“I was told I could be a judge”). During her turbulent adolescence, her drivenness generally kept her moving—setting goals and being action-oriented. She knew education was crucial. However, she despaired during periods of depression, upheaval, and certainly just before and after dropping out of high school and college. Urgent defending and rescuing, including advocating for the rape victim against one of her professors, put her future career potentially at risk.

She was eager to establish a career and thought that geographic distance from her roots would help her move toward that goal. However, she was vulnerable in the volatile context of her first full-time university position at age 22. Her strong résumé and interview had led colleagues to have unreasonable expectations. Then, when her difficult pregnancy required a medical leave and changes in their workload, they were angry. Her contract was not renewed. A successful grievance process helped her realize that not just her own behaviors contributed to conflict. However, she also realized that the situation might have been resolved without the anger-driven formal action.

Ironically, when she taught high school English for a year, after relocating to be near her father (“to come to terms with my family”), her second assignment was cheerleading cosponsor. She experienced success in both areas. Her high-risk students performed well on state exams, and the cheerleaders won a national championship, helping her to gain closure on her own high school years. Some colleagues viewed her intense investment in students negatively. Nevertheless, she seriously considered teaching as a career for the first time, but it would need to be at the college level. She realized she had been drained by the needs of students who lived in difficult circumstances and had limited autonomy.

When she and her husband took new university positions, again far away, it was “the first time in my adult life” a major decision had been made calmly. There, a comfortable home and neighborhood allowed her to focus on career. She established a popular, intellectually stimulating extracurricular program for college students, found a good therapist, and enjoyed her children. Her direction was clear, and her strengths had been recognized and rewarded with employment.

Social development

Michelle’s social development was entwined with her emotional development. At the end of the study, she explained as follows:

The abuse wasn’t as significant as how it was dealt with. The sexual-abuse taboo precipitated humiliation of great magnitude and ostracism—deep alienation. All relationships were affected by that—and self-respect. Friendships from then on were unhealthy, not natural.

She also noted, “The shame is what lingers.” She countered her sense of urgency in social situations with insights and preemptive strategies to maintain control.

Peers

Given how negatively they behaved later, some female peers appear to have been preoccupied with her during the early school years, willing to follow her assertive leadership, but competitive. She continued to have difficulty developing friendships with female peers with similar ability and interests until nearly 30. She later offered this perspective on her social development:

[Someone to have my back] was what I didn’t have. By the time I was 15, I felt completely isolated. The only people I had access to couldn’t relate to me, including the years I spent with [boyfriend]. He couldn’t appreciate the essence of who I am. My mom pushed me toward him. I had a friend who was disturbed, bad inner life, awkward. Mom pushed me toward her. People who couldn’t hear me. The group my mom made sure I had access to [had] the least credibility in the community, the most impoverished, [some] who had done terrible things. There was a boy I really liked, a good kid. Two parents who cared about him. His mom had invited me over. My mom told her that he was fine for my brother to be with, but not for me. She would force me to cancel plans, wouldn’t let me go out with good kids, increasingly isolated by rules as a teen. Maybe she got something out of my suffering, protecting the secrets. She would tell me that loss of friends was all my fault.

Her later boyfriend’s view that the social world was dangerous also affected her relationships with peers. In college, this former leader was intimidated by new people, viewing “my paranoia” as being related to sex. However, feeling alienated and “abnormal” was a more significant concern.

As an adult, she reflected, “I was really in the cracks in college—except that I was beautiful and got the kind of attention I didn’t want.” Someone repeatedly sent inappropriate e-mail messages to her, and during a summer institute a male graduate assistant sexually harassed her. Fortunately, “outsiders—two women, PhDs” called her aside and helped her confront him. However, “in the fall, I was made to be the one with problems. One professor’s attitude was that I was a wild, loose person, superstarish, comfortable with my sexuality.” Late in college, after the harassment, she cut her hair extremely short, applied what she had learned about communication, and purposefully avoided behaviors that might be interpreted as sexual.

The interpersonal upheaval surrounding various traumatic experiences interfered with closure with extended family, high school, hometown, boyfriend, and university. She remained ambivalent about her experiences with each of these. Not unlike her response to other experiences, she would long question the “trueness” and “realness” of her relationship with her boyfriend. At 20, she said, “It all seems like a lie, with the new realization [that it was abusive].” However, gradually, she found ways to heal relationships after clarifying them through counseling. After moving to her second university teaching context, she used social media to connect with relatives, including letting them know how well her children were developing. Former classmates also came on board.

Family

Eventual communication with her parents was the result of considerable cognitive effort. Through her own parenting behaviors, she gained insights about theirs. By her early 20s, she and her mother had, in her words, “things we can talk about, nothing from childhood, though, and I don’t share my problems. I still malfunction if I feel trapped or infringed on by her. So I try to control our time together.” She was concerned about her brother and responded when he called. Important to her healing, he eventually grasped the impact of his actions. She also maintained contact with her sister, vigilant about her well-being and relieved at her success in college. She made sense of her mother’s lack of protection: “In the process, I’ve felt a great deal of empathy for what my mother missed in a partner.” Shortly after the study ended, they resumed a cautious connection.

Emotional development

Michelle bore the brunt when the sexual abuse was revealed: “They said, ‘It’s your fault’—for talking about it.” In school, at home, and later, regardless of what they knew about her background, adults and peers misunderstood her poise as reflecting she did not need support. However, even as an adolescent, she proactively used her strengths to regain agency. She wrote, read self-help books and college textbooks, and, because her family did not validate her experiences, found supporters elsewhere to help her distinguish “the real from the unreal.”

When reflecting on her childhood, she realized that her fears and anxiety did not disturb or harm others. The eating disorder and obsessive exercising in early adolescence were self-harming. Yet, she self-protectively left a hostile school environment. When she was 15, a boyfriend told her, “The most important thing is to survive.” His mother’s words would also have long-term impact: “Everyone has one really bad time in their life. This is yours, and nothing will ever be this bad again.” At 20, “not so reactive anymore,” she slowed down her rush to finish college and reflected on her progress: “I have made an effort to surround myself with light-hearted people.”

Counselors helped her make sense of emotions and behaviors. Through therapy at ages 14 and 15 she learned to dissociate, and later she said that “deep reflection, journaling, and observing” in response to isolation gave meaning to experiences. Medication and therapy helped her survive and heal, and she realized later that therapy had not been intended to restructure her personality. As an adult, she wrote, “Marriage helped create feelings of security so that I could begin the essential work.” She experienced pregnancy and her daughter’s birth as “transcendent . . . seeing the point of human experience” as well as “gaining ownership and relationship with my body.”

Each traumatic experience generated a sense of powerlessness, shame, sadness, or rage—or all of these. However, in her journal during adolescence, she wrote, “I’m sick of not being able to express.” A poem for a school project included “tears never cried and never dried.” Through therapy, after her first university position, she became less afraid of emotions. She could finally allow grief and humiliation at age 26, and soon a therapist connected extreme feelings to PTSD. Subsequently, her proactively divorcing her parents was the result of concern for her children’s safety, “taking responsibility for healthy boundaries,” and failed attempts to make sense of feelings and behaviors in their presence. She realized that she, not they, should be her focus for change.

She became increasingly able to manage the urge to take action elsewhere as well, including with finances, recognizing that buying reflected a need to feel normal and not constrained. As her English-teaching year ended, she also recognized that her sensitivity to disadvantaged adolescents and her concerns about maintaining appropriate boundaries had depleted her emotionally. In her next university position, she set guidelines for students who asked for personal help, but was still too accessible and too inclined to rescue, affecting energy needed for teaching and self-care. Here, again, she self-corrected. Early in her first year there, her husband helped her harness extreme emotions and an urgency to act, including when someone tried to engage her—new, untenured, and with small children—in a program potentially requiring considerable absence from home. She recognized that the person’s aggression mirrored her father’s: “PTSD territory.”

She could be fiercely protective, but knew she needed to monitor her reactivity. In general, when needing to manage her children’s behavior, she gave considerable thought to how she might redirect her own efforts and their behaviors. However, when a playmate wanted to “play doctor” and the mother dismissed Michelle’s concern, Michelle was assertive, simultaneously aware of her perceptions of the social world: “Caring for the children has been a process of caring for myself.”

Discussion

Trauma has been described as being markedly distressing, perceived as threatening to life or physical integrity, and associated with feelings of helplessness, fear, horror, and/or disgust (Greenwald, 2005). However, clinical criteria have been challenged as not adequately representing variations in responses to traumatic experiences (Dell’Osso & Carmassi, 2011). Indeed, high-stress experiences that do not meet diagnostic criteria, like many of Michelle’s, have been associated with PTSD symptoms (Boals & Schuettler, 2009). Pertinent here, Banyard, Williams, and Siegel (2001) found that CSA can contribute to multiple traumatic experiences even into adulthood. Trauma seemed to beget trauma for Michelle, and posttrauma distress was at times debilitating. However, her inclination to act, borne of a pervasive sense of urgency, appears to have been associated not just with a need for control and with behavioral risks, but also with developmental progress. Her cognitive ability and resilience also supported her.

Developmental Tasks

Several studies offer possible explanation of how Michelle accomplished developmental tasks in spite of traumatic experiences. Although her relationship with her father changed, she credited him with affirming her strengths earlier, reflecting Schlosser and Yewchuk’s (1998) assertion that fathers play a significant role in the development of capable females. In addition, Lev-Wiesel (2000) found that survivors who attributed abuse to offenders’ characteristics, rather than their own, were more likely to have intact self-esteem and a higher quality of life than those who did not. Over time, counselors helped Michelle put responsibility on people who had harmed her. Yet, gradually, Michelle’s communication with her brother also helped her to have compassion for him and to forgive him. Forgiveness and perceived victimization have been negatively correlated (Holeman & Myers, 1998). She also was able to classify life experiences as epiphanies, critical to growth (Gasker, 2001). She wrote and talked about their importance in moving her forward.

Her struggle with identity development reflected others’ discomfort with her abilities. However, gradually she integrated intellectual and other strengths into her identity (Mahoney, Martin, & Martin, 2006). That process reflects aspects of moratorium status (e.g., search for answers, vacillation) en route to identity achievement (e.g., commitment to occupation and ideology, solid beliefs, and decisions based on self-constructed values; Marcia, 1993).

Her deep internal conflict about mother, father, extended family, and school community interfered with her process of differentiating self (Bowen, 1978) from roots, even as she moved away from them. However, she became increasingly able “to cease automatically being one of the system’s emotional dominoes” and to take “maximum responsibility for one’s own emotional being and destiny rather than blaming others or the context” (Friedman, 1991, p. 141). In this process, she also moved toward moral autonomy, applying principles separate from others’ authority (Kohlberg, 1968).

Michelle’s progress in other areas reflects a finding in another study (Peterson, 2002) that convergence of developmental task accomplishments was associated with increased achievement motivation. In that regard, Michelle made notable progress toward direction, a mature relationship, identity, and autonomy during her year in graduate school—and she returned to her former achiever mode and could also envision future achievement. Further movement in these areas of development was evident when she relocated to the second university position, at which time she also reported being able to feel emotions at a new level.

Giftedness

Related to the intersection of ability and adversity, protective factors include exceptional talent, the ability to absorb information, and the belief that knowledge is power (Higgins, 1994). All of these were reliable strengths for Michelle. Furthermore, wisdom can help individuals make sense of extreme circumstances (Sternberg, 2000). Yet, gifted individuals do drop out of school, and gifted females are more likely than gifted males to drop out of school for personal, not other, reasons (Renzulli & Park, 2000), as Michelle did.

Widely varying definitions of giftedness and the dearth of comparative studies make pertinent reviews of literature about mental health problematic and inconclusive (Martin, Burns, & Schonlau, 2010). However, exceptional ability has sometimes been associated with unique vulnerability to mental health problems (MacCabe et al., 2010; Pfeiffer & Stocking, 2000; Rice, Leever, Christopher, & Porter, 2006). Pertinent to Michelle’s extreme emotional struggles during adolescence, Cassady and Cross (2006) noted that the structure of gifted individuals’ underlying representations of suicidal thoughts may be different from others’. This case study cannot make such an assertion, but how Michelle experienced various developmental challenges did reflect the intensity associated with giftedness (Daniels & Piechowski, 2009).

Michelle’s intuitive leaps reflected her cognitive strengths. Applying her new awareness of the overexcitabilities concept (see Piechowski, 2014) shortly before the study ended, she concluded that sensual and emotional OEs had driven her forward until intellectual OE could help her gain control of, and feel safe enough to feel, emotions: “learning to manage the OEs, mastering my body, deep trust in . . . universal laws.”

Giftedness has also been associated with the theory of positive disintegration (Dabrowski, 1967), which can be applied here. This theory posits that intense struggle and suffering may lead to disintegration, but also, through self-education and self-correction, to advanced personality development, manifested in empathy, altruism, and individuality. Michelle was often her own therapist, reflecting one aspect of the theory. She did not ask for, nor did I provide, direction or resources, except once, when she was 19. When she asked me for resources, I gave her Piechowski’s name (see Piechowski, 2014), and her subsequent library search led her also to Dabrowski (e.g., 1967, 1970). The latter’s work helped her find meaning in suffering and to incorporate struggle into her identity. She realized that struggle had helped her develop leadership, wisdom, and resilience.

Negative Outcomes of Trauma

Discussing PTSD with a therapist helped her make sense of the urgency that drove her actions. However, she wrestled with an impaired sense of self and interpersonal difficulties (Briere & Elliott, 1994), both associated with CSA. One summary of CSA literature (Ryan, 1989) provided an extended litany of common negative outcomes, many experienced by Michelle. In addition to those related to power, control, extreme and confusing emotions, and disordered eating, presented earlier here as themes, outcomes described by Ryan (1989) were low self-esteem; pervasive fears; struggles with developmental tasks; social isolation; feelings of guilt, anger, humiliation, and intrusion; depression; conflicting physical and emotional sensations; psychological confusion; dysfunctional coping; and risk of suicide and self-destructive behaviors. All are also associated with PTSD (American Psychiatric Association, 2000).

Pertinent to coping, Michelle’s extreme investment in cheerleading and exercise suggests addiction, likely used to ward off feelings of impending fragmentation (Connors, 1994). In addition, her experience with bulimia reflects the literature associating sexual abuse with disordered eating (Wonderlich et al., 2000), a strategy for coping with unbearable emotions (Woller, 2006). In Carter, Bewell, Blackmore, and Woodside’s (2006) study of patients with an eating disorder, 48% had experienced CSA, and these had relatively greater psychiatric comorbidity, such as depression, anxiety, lower self-esteem, and relational issues, all of these familiar to Michelle. In the Carter et al. study, sexual abuse was linked to binging and purging, rather than to restrictive eating. Michelle’s coping also reflected this distinction.

Factors contributing to negative developmental outcomes

Possible contributors to Michelle’s responses to trauma have also been discussed in CSA literature. Peleikis, Mykletun, and Dahl (2004) found that women with CSA who had been treated for anxiety disorders and/or depression often had been exposed to family background risk factors (FBRF). CSA increased risk for PTSD and self-inflicted harm, but mood disorders and current attachment level were associated with FBRF or other factors, not CSA. Nevertheless, pertinent to attachment, CSA might interfere with children finding a secure base in their parents, affecting the ability to trust and regulate emotions (Alexander, 1992). The reaction of family and community, as well as the psychological relationship with and degree of trust in the perpetrator, likely also affect the degree of impact. One review of literature found that more victims of fathers and brothers presented with clinically significant distress than did victims of stepfathers (Cyr, Wright, McDuff, & Perron, 2002).

An absence of adult support for Michelle after confidentiality was broken appears to have contributed to more than a decade of negative experiences. School experiences affected peer relations and trust in institutions, and later experiences reinforced her sense of vulnerability. Pertinent to her social development, a low level of friendship quality has been associated with anxiety disorders in individuals who have experienced CSA (Adams & Bukowski, 2007).

Related to parental roles, Aspelmeier, Elliott, and Smith (2007) concluded that attachment security at least partially protects against negative CSA outcomes, and maternal responses that convey protection and support have been associated with improved mental health and social functioning (Lovett, 2004). Michelle was not protected. Guelzow, Cornett, and Dougherty (2002) found that victims of CSA were more likely to report low maternal support than were nonvictims, suggesting that paternal support, missing for Michelle after childhood, is important for later psychological adjustment. Depression has been related to insensitive or unavailable parents or parents unable to tolerate a child’s autonomy (Blatt, Wein, Chevron, & Quinlan, 1979). Relevant here, Michelle’s father’s physical abuse coincided with her transition into adolescence.

Protective factors

Many protective factors appear in Michelle’s story: exceptional talents, inner resources, active investment in therapy (Higgins, 1994), self-understanding (Beardslee & Podorefsky, 1988), and a desire to be different from her parents (Herrenkohl, 1994). Higgins (1994) noted that survivors of trauma can love as adults, and choosing an effective spouse can counter effects of the past. In addition, according to Rak and Patterson’s (1996) summary of several longitudinal studies, being proactive, being an active problem solver, being able to gain others’ positive attention, being alert and autonomous, and having role models and mentors outside of the family are important factors of resilience, all of which characterized Michelle.

Outside support

Jonzon and Lindblad (2006) associated resources, more than number of risk factors, with health outcomes. Michelle’s environmental supports were a teacher, a student council adviser, a lawyer, counselors, and, earlier, her father. An early boyfriend offered some protection (cf. Adams & Bukowski, 2007). Her long-term boyfriend helped channel her anger, as did the female professors who helped her confront a harasser. Her husband, university faculty who treated her with respect, and some work contexts validated strengths “from the outside.”

In counseling, Michelle experienced transformation through detoxifying negative elements via gradual cognitive expansion and affect regulation and differentiation (Sollars, 2004). Woller (2006) noted the importance of emotional attachment through a positive therapeutic relationship. Michelle usually developed trusting relationships with her therapists, and involvement in the study also provided a nonjudgmental venue for long-term self-reflection.

Contributions to the Literature

This qualitative research case study, unusual in bridging the fields of giftedness, trauma, and development, involved essentially continuous contact with a participant for 15 years, a rare phenomenon in itself, contributing to the credibility of findings. The goal was to describe and explain enough that representations would correspond “to the way the world is and actually operates” (Patton, 2002, p. 546). Systematic data-gathering and thorough analysis give the findings dependability and trustworthiness. My own continual self-reflection, including with field notes over the long duration of the study, contributes to authenticity. Findings illuminate how a gifted female experienced development, which was affected by the complex aftermath of CSA and other trauma. That aftermath is not commonly approached qualitatively in the CSA literature and is absent in the giftedness literature.

The study was exploratory, but also contributed by “extending and deepening the theoretical propositions and understandings that have emerged from previous field studies” (Patton, 2002, p. 194)—in both giftedness and CSA, in this case. Michelle’s ability to articulate complex perspectives offered a rare window to developmental processes, concurrent with developmental psychologists’ interest in including gifted participants in studies to expand theory (e.g., Liben, 2009). It is probably not so noteworthy that trauma affected how and when Michelle accomplished major developmental tasks. However, the impact of domestic violence and sexual abuse may have taken particular form because of characteristics associated with giftedness, manifested in a heightened experience of self and inner transformation, and epitomizing positive disintegration (Dabrowski & Piechowski, 1977). In addition, her proactive behaviors to open developmental doors (e.g., intense self-reflection; dropping out of high school; entering college with a high school proficiency assessment, not a diploma; taking time off from college; finding counselors; inviting her father to speak to a class; divorcing her parents; using social media to gain closure) appear to reflect cognitive strengths, resilience (Higgins, 1994), a need for control, and a sense of special purpose, to which Lovecky (1992) applied the term entelechy.

Michelle’s abilities did not ensure that she could allow herself to feel emotions, but accomplishing major developmental tasks coincided with increased ability to feel and self-regulate. She reflected, “It’s not good just to regurgitate ideas unless you can do something with what you know, do the hard work of therapy, living, self-embracing.” By age 30, she had become a confident parent, spouse, friend, and teacher and was comfortable with herself.

Implications for Educators, Mental Health Professionals, and Researchers

Regardless of her exceptional abilities, Michelle experienced many common aspects of CSA and PTSD, findings that fit the trauma literature, but not the giftedness literature. With only rare exceptions (e.g., Hébert & Beardsley, 2001), researchers have not studied the intersection of giftedness and difficult environments phenomenologically. This study also calls attention to several other troubling phenomena that have only rarely, if ever, been explored as related to high ability, especially with qualitative methods: physical abuse, family violence, relational violence, disordered eating, parental divorce, dropping out of high school or college, drug use, sexual harassment, and public humiliation. Further exploration of high ability and these areas is needed, not only to build theory but also potentially to inform educators and mental health professionals who work with high-ability children, teens, and young adults. Their concerns, like Michelle’s, may not be readily apparent. Psychoeducational small-group work, for instance, may help gifted youth cope with developmental challenges (Peterson, 2006, 2008). Michelle said that discussing giftedness and development in the demonstration group just once had a positive effect on her.

Here, both exceptional ability and trauma appear to have had complex impact on development. However, limitations are that the study was not comparative, and because it was qualitative and a case study, findings should not be generalized. Whether Michelle’s experience is typical of gifted female survivors of trauma cannot be known, but insights and meanings deemed credible might be valuable (Stake, 1995) and transferable to other situations (Merriam, 2002).

School and other counselors and psychologists may not consider differentiating approaches for individuals with exceptional ability. Genuine, respectful interest in the internal world of gifted children, teens, and adults is essential for effective therapeutic work, and “therapeutic rupture” can occur when any helping professional does not consider the salience of giftedness (Yermish, 2010). Mental health professionals, researchers of development, and educators of the gifted need to learn from each other for the benefit of high-ability youth (Peterson, 2006), who are certainly not exempt from unsettling and even traumatic life events. How exceptional individuals experience pertinent developmental challenges and respond to traumatic experiences warrants attention.

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research and/or authorship of this article: Author received an internal summer Purdue Research Foundation grant in 2001, midway through this 15-year study, to conduct out-of-state interviews. No grant number is available at Purdue University.

Author Biography

Jean Sunde Peterson, PhD, professor emerita, Purdue University, has focused most of her research on gifted youth, often exploring their development longitudinally and qualitatively, with particular interest in those who do not fit common stereotypes. She has received numerous awards for teaching, research, and service; consults internationally; and served two terms on the NAGC Board of Directors.

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