engleski

A salutogenic model of psychosocial help

Psychosocial care and support for victims of war and catastrophes as well as other forms of professional help usually follow the medical model of mental health and illness. Thus professionals offering psychoscial assistance to war survivors mostly look for signs and symptoms of maladjustment bur rarely or not at all for possible positive changes. Inspired by the work of Joseph et. al, (1994), the authors developed a questionnaire aimed at measuring positive and negative psychological consequences of war trauma. The first results obtained by this questionnaire served as a basis for tentative salutogenic model of psychosocial help, which was later tested on 8 different groups of war victims, survivors and participants. The proposed model of the impact of traumatic experiences on adaptation suggests that positive and negative changes of cognitive and emotional functioning influence adaptation through the choice and implementation of coping skills and mechanisms.

war trauma; cognitive functioning; emotional functioning; coping skills; psychosocial care

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