The study examines the relationship between experiencing depersonalization during traumatic events and subsequent psychiatric symptomatology. Participants were 75 Boston University undergraduate students who reported I86 traumatic events. In formation about their experiences of depersonalization during these events was obtained by the Depersonalization Questionnaire (DQ) a scale based primarily on the Dissociation Experience Scale (Bernstein and Putnam, 1986). Symptomatology was measured by the Symptom Checklist-90-Revised . As predicted the participants who experienced depersonalization during traumatic events were found to be sign8cantly lower than those who did not on 7 out of the 9 SCL-90-R subscales and the General Severity Index (GSI) scale. When the severity of trauma was statistically controlled for, the significant differences between the two groups held up on five of the nine subscales and the GSI scale. These differences remained as significant when statistically controlling for the lime that passed since the traumatic events. These findings suggest that, for this sample, depersonalization during traumatic events played a significant role in defending [hem fiom the fill impact of these events.