Exposure to War-Related Traumata among Arab Children and Adolescents: A Review= تعرض الأطفال و المراهقين العرب لحوادث حرب صادمة:
Author: Itani, L., Jaalouk, D., Fayyad, J., Garcia, J. T., Chidiac, F., & Karam, E.
Source:
The Arab Journal of Psychiatry, 44(2151), 1-22
Objective: The Arab world has witnessed a series of armed conflicts with severe consequences on political,
economic and social levels still unfolding. A number of publications have looked closer at the rates of war
exposure among Arab children and adolescents. Method: A literature review on war exposure during
childhood/adolescence was conducted for all countries in the Arab world up to September 15, 2014 using the search
engines PubMed, and PsycINFO. Results: A total of 42 articles were included in this review: two about Iraq, four
about Kuwait, five about Lebanon, 26 about Palestine, three about Sudan, one from Somalia and one from SyriThe
majority of the studies were based on specific community samples (general, students, refugees, or residing in camps)
and a minority from primary health care centers. The studies discuss a variety of traumatizing war events that were
either ”general” (such as witnessing injured people, and the destruction of homes) or “personal”(such as being tortured,
or subjected to different forms of violence). Conclusion: War traumata tend to occur together and singling out one
trauma and studying its mental health outcome could be misleading.