Mediation of daily stressors on mental health within a conflict context

Alison Schafer, Hajar Masoud, Rania Sammour
2014 Intervention: International Journal of Mental Health, Psychosocial Work and Counselling in Areas of Armed Conflict  
The Inter-Agency Standing Committee (IASC) Guidelines on Mental Health and Psychosocial Support (IASC, 2007) promote the provision of basic needs and community/family supports as key approaches to improve the overall wellbeing of people a¡ected by crises, including con£ict. However, positive impacts and/or evidence base for these initiatives, seen through the lens of psychological theory and research, are limited. A World Vision AusAID livelihoods project in Gaza was qualitatively examined in
more » ... der to explore this question of how psychosocial supports improve wellbeing for men, women and children. Results of the qualitative examination presented in this papershow that locally prescribed feelings of wellbeing improved through the reduction of daily stressors and supported the model ofa mediating relationship between traumatic events and mental health, as suggested by Miller & Rasmussen (2010) .The paper also demonstrates thebene¢tsofa multidisciplinary and integrated psychosocial support approach for programmesdelivered with a whole-of-family perspective, which has more broadly supported the psychosocial needs of this con-£ict a¡ected community. The paper further re£ects on the important need for e¡ective measurement models in relation to ascertaining impacts of integrated psychosocial support approaches.
doi:10.1097/wtf.0000000000000031 fatcat:rumlsoqdjnbqpabkmqruhg4a4u