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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. Noam, his father, and which other member of his family fled together from the wreckage of the World Trade Center?

2. In which war did the veterans fight who gave Van der Kolk a particular gift for Christmas?

3. The Polyvagal Theory involves the existence of how many different levels of response within the control of the autonomic nervous system?

4. Who coined the phrase "the compulsion to repeat" (34) in the world of psychiatry?

5. What kind of role does Van der Kolk say Noam had been able to take in his own rescue, saving him from deeper trauma?

Short Essay Questions

1. What aspects of Noam's traumatic experience made it unlikely that he would suffer lasting negative effects throughout his life?

2. What are the three levels of response available to humans facing stressful situations, according to Steve Porges?

3. What development in the early 1990s revolutionized our understanding of the way the human brain processes information?

4. What problems began to manifest in Tom's life despite his appearance of an easy transition back to his normal life upon returning from combat?

5. Explain Charles Darwin's theory about the purpose of emotions and Van der Kolk's reason for including it.

6. In what way was summer camp a formative experience in Van der Kolk's trajectory toward his chosen career?

7. What conclusion did Van der Kolk come to after the experiment involving the human gaze?

8. What conclusion did Van der Kolk reach about the treatment of trauma after reading Charles Darwin's book The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals?

9. What traumatic event did Noam, the five-year-old discussed in Chapter 4, "Running For Your Life" witness?

10. In the prologue of the text, Van der Kolk names the three main avenues of treatment available to survivors of trauma. What are they?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Discuss Van der Kolk’s use of Aristotle's appeals within the text of The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma. How does Van der Kolk use each of the three appeals to persuade the reader of argumentative points central to the tenets of the work?

Essay Topic 2

Analyze the ways in which the themes of adaptability and resignation appear within Van der Kolk’s book The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma. What message is Van der Kolk sending about these two themes over the course of the text?

Essay Topic 3

How does Van der Kolk’s use of the first and second person point of view serve the purposes of the text? Discuss how Van der Kolk’s choice of point of view helps to advance the treatment of at least three particular themes within the text.

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