... have contributed, including the biological, but the psychological, especially the cognitive paradigm has indoctrinated the field of PTSD with numerous theories. These cognitive theories all propose that for an individual the event of trauma provides information that is incongruent with pre-existing beliefs about the world and that unsuccessful attempts to incorporate this novel information into existing models can lead to posttraumatic stress. However each theory differs in how and to what extent they account for the accumulating knowledge about PTSD. In drawing upon these differences, this essay will contrast three cognitive theories of PTSD: Horowitz's (1986) stress response theory; Foa and colleagues' (1986; 1989) fear network theory; Brewin, Dalgleish, and Joseph's (1996) dual representation theory. Many would agree that the experiencing of extreme catastrophic events, such as earthquakes, hurricanes and concentration camps is quite rare. However, most of us like to think of ourselves as living in a protective ...

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