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Storytelling is pervasive through life. Much information is stored, indexed, and retrieved in the form of stories. Although lectures tend to put people to sleep, stories move them to action. People relate to each other in terms of stories-and products and brands often play both central and peripheral roles in their stories. To aid storytelling research in consumer psychology, this article develops a narrative theory that describes how consumers use brands as props or anthropomorphic actors in stories they report about themselves and others. Such drama enactments enable these storytellers to experience powerful myths that reflect psychological archetypes. The article includes findings from case study research that probes propositions of the theory. Implications for consumer psychology and marketing practice follow the discussion of the findings.More often than not, in America at least, those who win in myth markets are performing a myth of rebelling; the most successful icons rely on an intimate and credible relationship with a rebel world: Nike with the African-American ghetto, Harley with outlaw bikers, Volkswagen with bohemian artists, Apple with cyberpunks, Mountain Dew with slackers-protagonists who would rather pursue quixotic activities than "grow up" and get serious about careers. (Holt, 2003)

Early research on the mental health of civilians displaced by armed conflict focused primarily on the direct effects of exposure to war-related violence and loss. Largely overlooked in this war exposure model were the powerful effects of ongoing stressors related to the experience of displacement itself. An ecological model of refugee distress is proposed, drawing on research demonstrating that mental health among refugees and asylum seekers stems not only from prior war exposure, but also from a host of ongoing stressors in their social ecology, or displacement-related stressors. Implications of this model for addressing the mental health and psychosocial needs of refugees and other displaced populations are considered.

Findings are presented from a narrative study that examined the use of interpreters in psychotherapy with refugees. Fifteen therapists and 15 interpreters were interviewed at 14 refugee mental health treatment centers in the United States. Core findings concerned the impact of interpreters on the therapeutic alliance, the complex emotional reactions that may arise within the therapy triad, the effects of interpreting on interpreters' own well-being, the multiple roles that interpreters play in addition to translating language, and the training and supervision needs of interpreters and of therapists who work with them. Implications of these findings for agencies that use interpreters in their clinical work with refugees are considered, and specific recommendations are made concerning the hiring, training, and support of interpreting staff.

The crisis in Syria has resulted in vast numbers of refugees seeking asylum in Syria’s neighbouring countries as well as in Europe. Refugees are at considerable risk of developing common mental disorders, including depression, anxiety, and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Most refugees do not have access to mental health services for these problems because of multiple barriers in national and refugee specific health systems, including limited availability of mental health professionals. To counter some of challenges arising from limited mental health system capacity the World Health Organization (WHO) has developed a range of scalable psychological interventions aimed at reducing psychological distress and improving functioning in people living in communities affected by adversity. These interventions, including Problem Management Plus (PM+) and its variants, are intended to be delivered through individual or group face-to-face or smartphone formats by lay, non-professional people who have not received specialized mental health training,We provide an evidence-based rationale for the use of the scalable PM+ oriented programmes being adapted for Syrian refugees and provide information on the newly launched STRENGTHS programme for adapting, testing and scaling up of PM+ in various modalities in both neighbouring and European countries hosting Syrian refugees.

This article describes a methodology for developing culturally grounded assessment measures in conflict and postconflict situations. A mixed-method design was used in Kabul, Afghanistan, to identify local indicators of distress and develop the 22-item Afghan Symptom Checklist (ASCL). The ASCL contains several indigenous items and items familiar to Western mental health professionals. The ASCL was pilot tested and subsequently administered to 324 adults in 8 districts of Kabul. It demonstrated excellent reliability (alpha=.93) and good construct validity, correlating strongly with a measure of exposure to war-related violence and loss (r=.70). Results of the survey indicate moderate levels of distress among Afghan men and markedly higher levels of distress and impaired functioning among women (and widows in particular).

Working in Afghanistan's capital city of Kabul, the authors assessed the relative contribution of daily stressors and war-related experiences of violence and loss to levels of depression, PTSD, impaired functioning, and a culturally specific measure of general psychological distress. For women, daily stressors were a better predictor than war experiences of all mental health outcomes except for PTSD; for men, daily stressors were a better predictor of depression and functional impairment, while war experiences and daily stressors were similarly predictive of general distress. For men, daily stressors moderated the relationship between war experiences and PTSD, which was significant only under conditions of low daily stress. The study's implications for research and intervention in conflict and post-conflict settings are considered.