From shell shock to PTSD: proof of war’s traumatic history

2015 marks several important First World War anniversaries: the centenary of the first use of poison gas in January; the centenary of the Gallipoli landings and the Armenian genocide in April. It is also 100 years since The Lancet published Charles S. Myers’ article, A Contribution to the Study of Shell Shock.

The study of shell shock

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Brief Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy Effects on Post-Treatment Suicide Attempts in a Military Sample: Results of a Randomized Clinical Trial With 2-Year Follow-Up

Objective: The authors evaluated the effectiveness of brief cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) for the prevention of suicide attempts in military personnel. Method: In a randomized controlled trial, active-duty Army soldiers at Fort Carson, Colo., who either attempted suicide or experienced suicidal ideation with intent, were randomly assigned to treatment as usual (N=76) or treatment as usual plus brief CBT (N=76). Assessment of incidence of suicide attempts during the follow-up period was conducted with the Suicide Attempt Self-Injury Interview.

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Descendants of Holocaust Survivors Have Altered Stress Hormones

A person's experience as a child or teenager can have a profound impact on their future children's lives, new work is showing.

Rachel Yehuda, a researcher in the growing field of epigenetics and the intergenerational effects of trauma, and her colleagues have long studied mass trauma survivors and their offspring. Their latest results reveal that descendants of people who survived the Holocaust have different stress hormone profiles than their peers, perhaps predisposing them to anxiety disorders.

 

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Objects, Nostalgia and the Dutch Colonial Elite in Times of Transition, ca. 1900–1970

This article analyses the role of the changing meanings of material objects in processes of identification, inclusion, and exclusion of people in the (former) colony and the Netherlands between 1900 and 1970. It reveals how and why people and nation-states relate to history, and to the Dutch colonial past in particular.

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RIPPLES OF TRAUMA AND RESILIENCE : PARTNER RELATIONSHIPS AMONG SECOND-GENERATION SURVIVORS OF THE HOLOCAUST

Many researchers assume that the continuing influences of the Holocaust on its survivors are long-term, and hypothesize that its stamp is also present in the lives of the second and third generations of Holocaust survivors (e.g., Shmotkin et al., 2011). This assumption notwithstanding, controlled studies have found that second-generation Holocaust survivors do not report more psychopathology (e.g., Van IJsendoorn et al., 2003).

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We are not numbers : Palestinian youth tell the human stories behind the numbers in the news

“There’s really no such thing as the ‘voiceless.’ There are only the deliberately silenced, or the preferably unheard.” --Arundhati Roy

When the world talks about Palestinians living under occupation and in refugee camps, it is usually in terms of politics and numbers – specifically, how many killed, injured, homeless and/or dependent on aid.

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Harmless Identities: Representations of Racial Consciousness among Three Generations Indo-Europeans

I wish to introduce the topic of racial consciousness with some words about a Dutch author born in the former colony of the Dutch East Indies: Hella S. Haasse. When she passed away in September 2011 at the age of 93, all obituaries affirmed she wasone of the most-respected and admired modern novelists, whose vivid and lively evocations of life in the former colony of the Dutch East Indies have...

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'They Have Forgotten to Gas You': Post-1945 Antisemitism in the Netherlands

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The Relevance of Resources for Resilience at Different Organizational Levels within the Military Deployment Cycle

AbstractIn the current study, the relative importance of different resources for psychological resilience of service members is investigated. The study employs a model of psychological resilience developed for the Netherlands Armed Forces, which identifies 25 resources for resilience at 5 different levels (individual, home front, team, leader, organization).

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Accelerated Resolution Therapy for treatment of pain secondary to symptoms of combat-related posttraumatic stress disorder

Background: As many as 70% of veterans with chronic pain treated within the US Veterans Administration (VA) system may have posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and conversely, up to 80% of those with PTSD may have pain. We describe pain experienced by US service members and veterans with symptoms of PTSD, and report on the effect of Accelerated Resolution Therapy (ART), a new, brief exposure-based therapy, on acute pain reduction secondary to treatment of symptoms of PTSD.

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