Psychological responses to war and atrocity: The limitations of current concepts

Patrick J. Bracken, Joan E. Giller and Derek Summerfield

Social Science & Medicine, 1995, vol. 40, issue 8, 1073-1082

Abstract: Because of the prevalence of wars, political violence and other forms of mandashmade disaster in Third World countries many individuals and communities suffer prolonged and often multiple traumas. In Western psychiatry certain conceptions of the response to violence and trauma have been developed, including the widely used category of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). We argue that because concepts such as PTSD implicitly endorse a Western ontology and value system, their use in nondashWestern groups should be, atmost, tentative.

Keywords: post-traumatic; stress; disorder; Third; World; war; torture (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 1995
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (15)

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