Childhood maltreatment and self-hatred as distinguishing characteristics of psychiatric patients with self-harm: A comparison with clinical and healthy controls.

Self-hatred and CM in the form of emotional abuse may be distinguishing characteristics of female patients with DSH in psychiatric settings. The present results are compatible with the hypothesis that emotional abuse leads to DSH via self-hatred, but the cross-sectional nature of the study precludes any causal conclusions. The clinical utility of the results is discussed.