Contemporary challenges serving immigrants and their communities require a reexamination of social services, social work practice, and social work curricula, as millions of people, particularly from non-European countries, have come to the United States in the last 40 years. Social work must develop a new field of specialization that addresses the…

Background: Comparatively little is known about the cognitive appraisals and coping styles of child road traffic accident (RTA) survivors that are associated with chronic post-traumatic reactions. Methods: Seventy-five children and young people aged 7-18 who were involved in a road traffic accident and attended an accident and emergency department…

In this article, the author compares the arguments of Susan Swartzlander, Diana Pace, and Virginia Lee Stamler (1993) who note the contradiction between the "shockingly unprofessional" practice of asking students to write about their personal traumas in writing courses and the common occurrence of such assignments with Jeffrey Berman…

This article focuses on infants in the first year of life who have experienced single or very circumscribed episodes of trauma in the context of otherwise relatively normal developmental trajectories. Young infants who experience pain may show heightened reactions to pain even years later. Children may remember, and may even reenact, traumatic…

In this paper, I describe the first 2 years of intensive psychotherapy of a multiply traumatized 5-year-old girl. I explore some of the ways in which violent and traumatic experiences were re-lived in the therapy and how they impacted on both patient and therapist. Within the discussion and illustrated by clinical vignettes, I consider the…

Effectiveness of an integrated trauma-informed approach to treating women with co-occurring disorders and histories of trauma was evaluated. Baseline and 12-month assessments were completed by 136 intervention- and 177 comparison-group women. The intervention group received Seeking Safety, a trauma-specific group treatment focusing on safety and…

Psychological First Aid is an evidence-informed modular approach to help children, adolescents, adults, and families in the immediate aftermath of disaster and terrorism. Psychological First Aid is designed to reduce the initial distress caused by traumatic events and to foster short- and long-term adaptive functioning and coping. Principles and…

In this article, we attempt to bridge the gap between practice (service delivery) and philosophy (trauma theory, empowerment, and relational theory). Specifically, we identify 10 principles that define trauma-informed service, discuss the need for this type of service, and give some characteristics of trauma-informed services in eight different…

This brief summarizes the working paper, "The Science of Early Childhood Development: Closing the Gap between What We Know and What We Do" (ED503049). In early childhood, research on the biology of stress shows how major adversity, such as extreme poverty, abuse, or neglect can weaken developing brain architecture and permanently set the…

Two contrasting cases are discussed of boys with autistic spectrum disorder who had suffered cumulative trauma. Although their material was similar in many respects, the 9-year-old made excellent progress during therapy, while the 4-year-old developed much less in spite of being in intensive treatment. This contrast is discussed with regard to…

This paper suggests that some neuroscience concepts particularly concerned with brain pathways in trauma and fear, as well as the neurobiology of emotion, provide an additional vertex to the psychoanalytic understanding of patients' material. The role of the body has been neglected in psychoanalytic thought and formulations in favour of purely…

Objective: To examine the durability of improvement in child and maternal symptoms 6 months after termination of child-parent psychotherapy (CPP). Method: Seventy-five multiethnic preschool-age child-mother dyads from diverse socioeconomic backgrounds were randomly assigned to (1) CPP or (2) case management plus community referral for individual…

Using a quasi-experimental design, this study examined the effectiveness of a standardized intervention model designed to build resiliency in children of women with co-occurring mental health and substance use disorders and histories of interpersonal abuse. The children and mothers who participated in this study were a subset of the sample used…

This article presents findings from a quasi-experimental, nonrandomized group design study that explored whether trauma-enhanced substance abuse treatment results in longer residential treatment stays and improved outcomes compared with treatment-as-usual. We used a subsample (N = 461) of participants in the Women, Co-Occurring Disorders and…

Using data from a common cross-site protocol administered at study enrollment, in this article we examine key characteristics of 2,729 participants in the Women, Co-Occurring Disorders and Violence Study (WCDVS), including demographics, physical health, mental health, substance abuse, trauma experiences, parenting status, and past history of…