![]() Shared learned behavior and meanings acquired in life activity contexts that are passed on from generation to another for purposes of promoting survival, adaptation, and adjustment. 7).Īccording to Marsella ( 2010), culture is: Such sociocultural approaches to understanding experiences of trauma therefore consider it to be a process that exists both in the intrapsychic realm of the individual as well as within sociocultural realm of relations and interactions-that is “embedded, situated, distributed, and co-constructed within contexts while also being intrinsically interwoven into these contexts” (Stetsenko, 2008, p. Therefore, culture plays an important role in shaping our identity, and constructs our reality via a process of cultural representations within a specific historical and cultural context (p. Human development is thus embedded in social networks, interpersonal relations, and local environment. Furthermore, culture is not a static characteristic of an individual who continually adapts to ever-changing environments. It aims in particular to examine the complex interplay between culture and trauma as it relates to refugee populations.Ĭulture here is considered as a set of practices executed in a tangible and observable way by a social group, as well as internal patterns and belief systems, each level mutually reinforcing the other. ![]() ![]() This chapter offers an exploration of these approaches. Importantly, this also includes an acknowledgement of the broader political, social, and economic processes affecting mental health-such as the powerful effects of structural violence and social inequality (Kienzler et al., 2019 Kirmayer, 2019, 2018 Kirmayer et al., 2010 Kleinman, 1977, 1978 Petit & Wang, 2018). The approaches have particularly highlighted the importance of paying attention to the ways in which culture shapes expressions of distress and help- and health-seeking (Kienzler et al., 2019). Many are based on the seminal works of medical anthropologist and cross-cultural psychiatrist, Arthur Kleinman, who was among the first to highlight cross-cultural differences in “causal models” or narratives of traumatic experiences (Kleinman, 1977, 1978 Kleinman & Good, 2004). These contemporary approaches (such as transcultural, ethno-and ecosocial psychiatry as well as new cross-cultural psychology) have shifted away from treating culture purely as a confounding factor to be taken into consideration towards recognizing culture as constitutive of different worldviews with an inherently complex impact on experiences of trauma (Kaiser & Jo Weaver, 2019). Since the mid-twentieth century, however, a variety of new fields have developed. 1).Įarly approaches to the study of psychological phenomena from a cultural perspective was concerned with the application of biomedical psychiatric categories in non-Western settings. ![]() Simply put, “culture matters when it comes to understanding and treating psychological sequelae of traumatic events” (Chentsova Dutton & Maercker, 2019, p. Furthermore, recent research has provided evidence that post-traumatic responses “involve bodily and social processes that are based on cultural models, social scripts and scenarios much of this knowledge is tacit or implicit and emerges in response to specific cultural affordances that depend on social context.” (Kirmayer et al., 2018, p. These culturally-determined variations are seen in how experiences of trauma are described and labelled, beliefs about the causes of psychological distress, ways in which people heal from trauma (including both formal and informal mental health interventions), and how people experiencing trauma are treated within their communities (Weissbecker et al., 2018). Globally, the literature attests to substantial variations in how people worldwide respond to traumatic events. This may be particularly true of traumatic experiences which have the potential to shake the bedrock on which one’s belief systems are based (Drožđek & Wilson, 2007 Herman, 1992). Human beings have an inherent need to make sense of their experiences.
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