Posttraumatic growth after war: A study with former refugees and displaced people in Sarajevo

Abstract

Research carried out with survivors of a variety of different traumata indicates that a large proportion of them perceive positive changes in themselves after the trauma. This study investigated whether posttraumatic growth also could be found among people who had been exposed to particularly severe traumata over a period of several years (1991 to 1995) during the war in the area of the former Yugoslavia. Included in the study were two representative samples of adult former refugees and displaced people who lived anywhere in former Yugoslavia before the war and were currently living in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, three and a half years after the war. The main instrument was a new Bosnian translation of the Posttraumatic Growth Inventory. Results indicated some differences in the factor structure as compared with the original instrument. The overall means for the scale were considerably lower than reported in most studies on other kinds of trauma. Younger people reported considerably more growth than older people.

Religious Coping, Social Support and Subjective Severity as Predictors of Posttraumatic Growth in People Affected by the Earthquake in Chile on 27/2/2010

“…In this case, the self-perception factor clusters the dimensions of New Possibilities, Personal Strength and Appreciation of Life of the original instrument, while the other two factors were coincident with the theoretical dimensions proposed by Tedeschi and Calhoun [5]. A three-factor structure was also found in other populations [28,29]. In this study, α = 0.97 was obtained for the total scale and 0.96 for SP, 0.93 for IR and 0.87 for LP.…”

Posttraumatic Growth, Social Acknowledgment as Survivors, and Sense of Coherence in Former German Child Soldiers of World War II

“…Our finding that PTG is positively influenced by social acknowledgment as a survivor adds to the empirical knowledge base on the role of social support in PTG [14,15]. In contrast to social support, social acknowledgment as a survivor does not encompass the structural (e.g., the number of supporters) or functional (e.g., emotional aspects) supportiveness of the direct environment [29,30].…”

“…To the best of our knowledge, predictors of PTG in former child soldiers more than 60 years after deployment have not previously been investigated. In this study, we tested the hypotheses that social resources (having a partner and social acknowledgment as a survivor) [14,15], personal resources (sense of coherence) [16], and trauma characteristics (number of traumas and duration of deployment) [17] were positively related to posttraumatic growth. We also hypothesized that, more than 60 years after the war, PTSD symptoms, depression, anxiety, and somatic symptoms would not be related to PTG [18,19].…”

Posttraumatic Growth and Recovery from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder

“…For example, several researchers have reported that individuals who report severe PTSD symptoms also report more PTG than those experiencing a lower level of PTSD symptoms (McMillen et al, 1997;Park et al, 2008;Park et al, 1996;Snape, 1997). However, other researchers have found the opposite where individuals who experience more severe PTSD symptoms report less growth (e.g., Aldwin et al, 1994;Frazier et al, 2001;Ickovics et al, 2006) and in some studies no relationship is evident between PTG and PTSD symptoms (e.g., Cordova et al, 2001;Powell et al, 2003). Such mixed findings have prompted some researchers to suggest that the relationship between PTSD symptoms and PTG is best explained as a curvilinear relationship where distress is required to start the growth process, but high levels of distress prevent the growth process from occurring (e.g., Butler., 2007;Kleim & Ehlers, 2009;Lechner et al, 2006).…”