Killing Versus Witnessing Trauma: Implications for the Development of PTSD in Combat Medics

Killing in combat uniquely predicts elevated PTSD symptomatology among military veterans. This study investigated the effects of combat killing in a sample of 345 U.S. Army combat medics who had recently returned from operational deployments to Iraq or Afghanistan. Combat medics provide frontline medical care before, during, and after battles but also fight alongside other soldiers when under attack. Attempting to kill in combat was a significant predictor of PTSD symptomatology even after accounting for passively witnessing trauma in fellow soldiers. Medics may be well prepared to cope with the passive experiencing and witnessing of war-zone trauma, but may benefit from training to cope with the negative consequences of taking actions to kill.     

Support Group Needs for People Living with HIV and AIDS (PLWHA) in Communities around Durban,South Africa

The study constructed a participant centred perspective of what members of a support group for people living with HIV and AIDS (PLWHA) desired from their group meetings. The study sample (n = 34) was from three support groups of PLWHA in a province of South Africa (males = 7, female = 27, mean age = 34.2 years, SD = 6.8 years). Participants completed a brief survey and participated in focus group discussion on views on the ideal support group, actual experience with the support group, and solutions for effective support groups. Findings suggest most members of the support group experienced a high degree of stigma at home and needed a so-called ‘safe space’ to escape to and discuss issues with people experiencing similar problems. Respondents wanted to acquire skills to allow them to help themselves and others in the community. They also desired HIV education so that they could properly understand the virus and help the community understand it to reduce stigma.     

Gains without pains? Growth after positive events

While past research suggests that people experience positive psychological changes after adverse events, little is known about psychological changes that happen after positive events. Adult participants (N?=?605) went online to complete a new self-report instrument measuring positive psychological changes linked to positive events, changes that I provisionally call post-ecstatic growth. Factor analysis indicated that this growth happens in four domains: deeper spirituality, increased meaning and purpose in life, improved relationships, and greater self-esteem. Participants were particularly likely to report growth after events that evoked feelings of inspiration and meaning, and events that led them to see new opportunities.     

Adverse developmental experiences and risky health behaviours among black South African university students

This study examined the relationship between adverse developmental experiences (ADEs) and risky health behaviours among a cross-sectional sample of black South African students (n = 393; females = 58%, M_age = 20.5 years, SD = 2.9). Binary logistic regression was used to model the association between categories of ADEs and risky health behaviours. Findings suggest individual ADEs to significantly predict risky health behaviours. The highest singular ADEs reported were being treated like a child (62%), parents being overprotective (59%), and being driven to be perfectionistic (58%). There was no indication of a general trend of ordered associations between the number of ADEs and risky health behaviours.     

Subjective relational experiences and employee innovative behaviors in the workplace

This paper presents two studies that explore the implications of subjective relational experiences (positive regard, mutuality and vitality) on employee engagement in innovative behaviors at work. Data collected at two points in time were used to test two mediation models that link subjective relational experiences and innovative behaviors. The results of Study 1 indicate that subjective relational experiences directly and indirectly, through affective commitment, are associated with employee engagement in innovative behaviors. The results of Study 2 indicate that subjective relational experiences are positively related to psychological availability, creative self-efficacy, and engagement in innovative behaviors. In addition, the findings of Study 2 indicate that creative self-efficacy fully mediates the relationship between psychological availability and engagement in innovative behaviors, and partially mediates the link between subjective relational experiences and employee engagement in innovative behaviors. The findings of both studies provide further support to the theoretical distinction between psychological state engagement and behavioral engagement at work.     

Evoking children's spirituality in the reciprocal relationships of a learning community

Findings from my doctoral research suggest that the reciprocal relationships within a learning community can evoke and nurture children's spirituality. The study investigated the development of a community of learners in four primary school classrooms in Aotearoa New Zealand. A key finding of this study showed that when teachers and children learned together, shared decisions, and respected and trusted one another, changes were observed in some children that could not be explained in intellectual, social or emotional terms. Further analyses of these data revealed qualities that pointed to a spiritual essence. This paper presents these spiritually themed results and explores the argument that the caring, responsive and reciprocal relationships of a community of learners can provide opportunities for spiritual development.     

From the numinous to the sacred

Abstract :  Jung took the idea of the 'numinous' from Rudolf Otto's book Das Heilige (E.T. The Idea of the Holy ) and made it central to his understanding of religion. However, as Lucy Huskinson has recently pointed out, this involves a misreading of Otto's work in which we have to look beyond the numinous (which is the non-rational factor in religion) towards the 'holy' which, like a symbol, holds the rational and non-rational aspects of religious experience together in a personally transformative way. This understanding of the spiritual and psychological journey is supported by case material in which a numinous experience, arising in the context of intensive analytical psychotherapy, proved to be but the first step in a process which led, through a period of mourning, towards the development of the patient's capacity to symbolize. In the light of this, the author suggests that the sacred is to be found in the capacity for a certain quality of symbolic relatedness—to self and other—which may or may not be attended by numinous experience.     

“There's a deeper level of meaning as to what suffering's all about”: experiences of religious and spiritual growth following trauma

Some survivors of trauma report experiencing beneficial changes in self-perception, relationships, and philosophy of life, and positive changes in the realm of existential, spiritual, or religious matters. The purpose of the present study was to examine participants’ phenomenological experiences of spiritual and religious posttraumatic growth (PTG). Transcribed data from semi-structured interviews with 10 women, self-identified as Christian, who had experienced spiritual or religious growth following various trauma were analysed using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis. Results indicated how religion provided a framework that assisted participants to incorporate life changes, and to find meaning in their suffering. The most salient themes identified in relation to religious and spiritual PTG included: process of spiritual and religious growth, strengthening of religious and spiritual beliefs, and personal and spiritual growth and healing. Participants’ trauma and associated distress prompted a process of questioning and meaning-making that facilitated deeply experienced personal and spiritual growth, and was related to intrinsic religiosity.     

Consciousness lost and found: subjective experiences in an unresponsive state

Anesthetic-induced changes in the neural activity of the brain have been recently utilized as a research model to investigate the neural mechanisms of phenomenal consciousness. However, the anesthesiologic definition of consciousness as “responsiveness to the environment” seems to sidestep the possibility that an unresponsive individual may have subjective experiences. The aim of the present study was to analyze subjective reports in sessions where sedation and the loss of responsiveness were induced by dexmedetomidine, propofol, sevoflurane or xenon in a nonsurgical experimental setting. After regaining responsiveness, participants recalled subjective experiences in almost 60% of sessions. During dexmedetomidine sessions, subjective experiences were associated with shallower “depth of sedation” as measured by an electroencephalography-derived anesthesia depth monitor. Results confirm that subjective experiences may occur during clinically defined unresponsiveness, and that studies aiming to investigate phenomenal consciousness under sedative and anesthetic effects should control the subjective state of unresponsive participants with post-recovery interviews.