The structural modeling of internal and external entrapment based on childhood trauma with regard to the mediating role of paranoid thoughts in medical students

The purpose of the research was to test the fit of the structural modeling of internal and external entrapment on childhood trauma with regard to the mediating role of paranoid thoughts in medical students of Qom province.

This research was a fundamental and descriptive-correlational research study using structural equation modeling. The statistical population of the research was made up of all medical students of Islamic Azad University of Qom province, who were studying in the academic year 2022-2023. The sample size of the study included 271 participants, who were selected based on available sampling method. To collect and measure the data, Bernstein et al.'s (2003) childhood trauma questionnaire, Gilbert and Allan's (1998) entrapment questionnaire, and Green et al.'s (2008) paranoid thoughts questionnaire were directly used. The collected data were analyzed by correlation matrix method and structural equation modeling. SPSS 26 and Smart PLS3 were used for data analysis.

The findings of the research showed that the indicators of the proposed model have an acceptable fit. The results showed that childhood trauma and paranoid thoughts have a direct effect on the entrapment of internal and external at 0.95 % confidence level. Also sobel test results indicated that childhood trauma has an indirect effect on the internal and external entrapment through mediating paranoid thoughts.

Childhood trauma and paranoid thoughts in medical students can directly and indirectly affect the internal and external entrapment.