Stockholm Syndrome

Stockholm Syndrome is a psychological and emotional reaction that captives experience when subjected to life-threatening situations over an extended period of time. Individuals activate this survival mechanism when exposed to traumatic situations that involve a direct threat on their lives while being held against their will. The term originated following an attempted bank robbery and subsequent hostage situation in Sweden, in 1973, in which the hostages began to sympathize with their captors and resisted rescue [Page 453]attempts by law enforcement agencies. As a result of the media sensationalism surrounding the Swedish hostages' unusual behavior and the well-publicized kidnapping and trial of Patricia Campbell Hearst, in 1974, many social scientists and psychologists began studying the phenomenon of emotional bonding between hostages and their captors to determine whether this type of reaction was rare or more commonplace.

Victims who develop Stockholm Syndrome create emotional bonds with their captors characterized by fear of them, as well as feelings of loyalty, understanding, and sympathy to their captors' situations. In some instances, victims replace their beliefs with those of the people threatening their lives. In the bank robbery incident that gave the syndrome its name, the four hostages actively resisted rescue and actually solicited funds for their captors' legal defense.

Although Stockholm Syndrome is primarily experienced by captives in hostage or terrorist situations, it has also been identified in cult members, victims of hijackings, prisoners of war, incest victims, domestic violence victims, and in a modified form in correctional officers, but anyone can develop it when exposed to the following conditions:

• A direct threat to one's survival and the perception that the person making the threat is capable of acting on it.
• The person making threats is also perceived as being kind, because of small acts of compassion and kindness.
• Isolation from the outside world such that the other person's beliefs and perspectives are the only ones available.
• The belief that there is no escape and one's life is in the hands of the individual making the threats.