"I had no family, but I made family'. Immediate post-war coping strategies of adolescent survivors of the Holocaust (original) (raw)
Related papers
Holocaust survivors: Coping with post-traumatic memories in childhood and 40 years later
Journal of Traumatic Stress, 1990
This essay deals with coping processes of childhood trauma of survivors who were children during World War H over the lifecycle in a nonclinical group. The main issues refer to: (1) responses to war memories immediately after the war and 40years later; (2) dealing with memories and feelings at present; (3) victims" feelings and attitudes toward the persecutor; (4) attitudes of survivors" children to the war experience of their parents; and (5) coping styles immediately and 40 years after the war, including the survivors" responses at present. Using a semistructural interview and a qualitative content analysis of interviews, it is suggested that for most persons the reactivation of memories and the need to document their experiences enhances, in a limited scope, the recognition of their loss and brings some relief," it also discloses new ways for these adults to comprehend their traumatic past.
Journal of Traumatic Stress, 2003
The present study assessed posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms, psychological distress, and subjective quality of life (QoL) in a group of 43 child Holocaust survivors and a community sample of 44 persons who had not personally experienced the Holocaust. The participants were administered the PTSD-Scale, the SCL-90, and the WHOQOL-Bref. Results showed that the child survivors had higher PTSD symptom scores, higher depression, anxiety, somatization, and anger-hostility scores; and lower physical, psychological, and social QoL than did the comparison group. The findings suggest that the psychological consequences of being a child during the Holocaust can be long lasting.
Development and Psychopathology, 2007
The long-term effects of extreme war-related trauma on the second and the third generation of Holocaust survivors HS! were examined in 88 middle-class families. Differences in functioning between adult offspring of HS~HSO! and a comparison group, as well as the psychosocial functioning of adolescent grandchildren of HS, were studied. Degree of presence of Holocaust in the family was examined in families in which both parents were HSO, either mother or father was HSO, and neither parent was HSO. Mothers' Holocaust background was associated with higher levels of psychological distress and less positive parenting representations. In line with synergic~multiplicative! models of risk, adolescents in families where both parents were HSO perceived their mothers as less accepting and less encouraging independence, and reported less positive self-perceptions than their counterparts. They also perceived their fathers as less accepting and less encouraging independence, showed higher levels of ambivalent attachment style, and according to their peers, demonstrated poorer adjustment during military basic training than their fellow recruits from the one-parent HSO group. Parents and adolescents in the one-parent HSO group functioned similarly to others with no Holocaust background. Parenting variables mediated the association across generations between degree of Holocaust experience in the family of origin of the parents and ambivalent attachment style and self-perception of the adolescents. It is recommended that researchers and clinicians develop awareness of the possible traces of trauma in the second and the third generation despite their sound functioning in their daily lives.
Psychological and Socio-Demographic Data Contributing to the Resilience of Holocaust Survivors
The authors provide a within-group study of 65 Former Hidden Children (FHC; i.e., Jewish youths who spent World War II in various hideaway shelters across Nazioccupied Europe) evaluated by the Hopkins Symptom Check List (HSCL), the Sense of Coherence Scale (SOCS), the Resilience Scale for Adults (RSA), and a socio-demographic questionnaire. The aim of the present article is to address the sensitization model of resilience (consisting in a reduction of resistance to additional stress due to previous exposure to trauma) and to identify the family, psychological, and socio-demographic characteristics that predict resilience among a group of FHC. The RSA score is negatively correlated with the number of post-war traumas and positively correlated with the SOCS score. FHC who have children present a higher RSA score than FHC who have no children. RSA global score negatively and significantly predicts HSCL score. In a global multivariate model, and in accordance with the sensitization model, the number of post-war traumas negatively predicts the RSA score. Moreover, the SOCS score and the number of children positively predict it. Therapeutic implications are discussed, limitations are considered, and further investigations are proposed.
Living with" the Past: Coping and Patterns in Families of Holocaust Survivors
Family Process, 2003
This exploratory study looks at how families of Holocaust survivors work through the traumatic past by considering the coping patterns adapted by family members. Life-story interviews with 57 individuals from 20 families, in which there were two to three generations, were used in order to learn about the significance they attach to the Holocaust past. The interviews were analyzed using Rosenthal's methods and
Aging & Mental Health, 2011
Objective: The Holocaust has become an iconic example of immense human-made catastrophes, and survivors are now coping with normal aging processes. Childhood trauma may leave the survivors more vulnerable when they are facing stress related to old age, whereas their offspring might have a challenging role of protecting their own parents from further pain. Here we examine the psychological adaptation of Holocaust survivors and their offspring in light of these new challenges, examining satisfaction with life, mental health, cognitive abilities, dissociative symptoms, and physical health. Methods: Careful matching of female Holocaust survivors and comparison subjects living in Israel was employed to form a case-control study design with two generations, including four groups: 32 elderly female Holocaust survivors and 47 daughters, and 33 elderly women in the comparison group, and 32 daughters (total N ¼ 174). Participants completed several measures of mental and physical health, and their cognitive functioning was examined. The current study is a follow-up of a previous study conducted 11 years ago with the same participants. Results: Holocaust survivors showed more dissociative symptomatology (odds ¼ 2.39) and less satisfaction with their life (odds ¼ 2.79) as compared to a matched group. Nonetheless, adult offspring of Holocaust survivors showed no differences in their physical, psychological, and cognitive functioning as compared to matched controls. Conclusions: Holocaust survivors still display posttraumatic stress symptoms almost 70 years after the trauma, whereas no intergenerational transmission of trauma was found among the second generation.
Family Process, 2000
The objective of the present study was to inquire into the long-term effects of child survivors' Holocaust experience. To this end, 170 Holocaust survivors who were born after 1926 completed questionnaires with regard to psychological distress, Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), Quality of Life (QoL), Self-identity, and Potency. The survivors were divided into four groups based on the setting of their experience during the Holocaust: Catholic Institutions, Christian foster families, concentration camps, and hiding in the woods and/or with partisans. Results showed that survivors who had been with foster families scored significantly higher on several of the measures of distress, whereas survivors who had been in the woods and/or with partisans scored significantly higher on several of the positive measures, QoL, potency, and self-identity. The discussion focuses on understanding the different experiences according to developmental theory and sense of control. It was concluded that there are group differences between child survivors according to their Holocaust experience.
Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 1989
The present study explored the differences between male and female Holocaust survivors (n = 34) and controls (n = 34) who were similar to the survivors but had not been victims of the Holocaust Half of the respondents were from the city and the other half were from the Kibbutz. The main dependent measures included the CAQ, the TSCS, and a specially designed Centrality of Family scale. Survivors were worse off psychologically than comparison individuals on the quality of emotional life, on emotional expression, and on the quality of interpersonal relations. Also, survivors assigned relatively greater value to their postwar families. City survivors seem to be worse off than Kibbutz survivors, and male survivors from the city had the lowest scores on several key subscales. These data were corroborated and extended by a content analysis of an open-ended interview conducted after the objective measures had been completed. The findings and their implications for understanding the effects of massive traumatization over individuals' life cycles are discussed. After the Second World War, mental health professionals coined the term survivor's syndrome to define the psychopathology that afflicted survivors of the Holocaust (Krystal, 1968; Meerioo, 1963). Past discussions of this syndrome have noted changes in survivors' quality of emotional life, interpersonal relations, and functioning as spouses and parents. Reports on survivors' quality of emotional life have noted a chronic sense of anxiety (e.g., De Graaf, 1975) and depressiveness (e.g., Niederland, 1968)aswell as feelings of guilt (Chodoff, 1986). This guilt (Klein, 1973) has been linked to other phenomena like the difficulty of survivors (Krystal, 1968) and their descendants (Nadler, Kav-Venaki, & Gleitman, 1985) to externalize aggression. Difficulties in emotional expression (e.g., Danieli. 1982; Kav-Venaki, Nadler, & Gershoni, 1985), which may explain the high frequency of psychosomatic complaints (e.g., Eitinger, 1972), have also been noted.