Individual 2

Other reports published by the Natural Hazards Research Center refer to major incidents where people have had to leave their homes, sometimes in circumstances where they were uncertain whether they would be able to return. In Quick Report no. 167 Benight et al. reported on the experiences of people who were evacuated from their homes during extensive forest fires in Colorado, USA, in 2002. Most were able to return to their homes within a matter of weeks, but the homes of seven of the 109 participants had been destroyed. One issue investigated by Benight et al. was the relationship between coping self efficacy and reactions to the evacuation. Coping self efficacy (CSE) is the individual's belief that he or she will be capable of taking appropriate action in an emergency. It was found that individuals with higher CSE were likely to leave their homes sooner after receiving the instruction to evacuate, and they were less likely to suffer post-traumatic stress symptoms afterwards. As the data set is correlational the results are not conclusive, but they suggest that confidence in one's coping skills will tend to lead to swifter practical action and lower levels of emotional distress.

It is possible that in several of the communities described in this website individuals with greater confidence in their abilities and coping skills decided to leave at a relatively early stage. On St Kilda, for example, a large group of people attempted to emigrate to Australia almost eighty years before the final evacuation, presumably because they expected to be able to build a new life for themselves in another country. In addition, a number of individual young men left St Kilda in the years immediately preceding the evacuation; presumably they had more hope of gaining employment on the Scottish mainland.

Other research has investigated a range of variables that may be associated with the amount of stress suffered after traumatic events. This work has been summarised by Ozer et al. (2003), who conducted a meta-analysis of 68 studies. Seven key factors that significantly predict the development of post-traumatic stress were identified:

1 Prior traumatic experiences, particularly those involving interpersonal violence.
2 Prior psychological adjustment, particularly depression
3 Family history of psychopathology. Again, this was particularly true when the traumatic event involved interpersonal violence.
4 Perceived threat to life during the trauma.
5 Post-trauma social support, an effect that became stronger as time since the trauma increased.
6 Peritraumatic emotional responses, including fear, helplessness, horror, guilt, and shame.
7 Peritraumatic dissociation, i.e. a numbing of emotional experience at the time of the trauma and an unconscious tendency to avoid paying attention to the traumatic events

For more information about post-traumatic stress the website of the Australian Centre for Posttraumatic Mental Health is highly recommended, at http://www.acpmh.unimelb.edu.au/index.html. The website includes a comprehensive summary of recent literature at this address.

In the last few years psychologists have begun to criticise the tendency in the research literature on trauma and bereavement to focus excessively on maladaptive reactions. This bias has no doubt arisen from the fact that therapy and general support are more likely to be provided to people who are not coping well. However, it is now clear that even after very major incidents a large proportion of people make a good adjustment. For some time after the incident they may experience strong negative emotions and some of the common elements of post-traumatic stress, but they will not be overwhelmed by such reactions and in general they will recover well from the incident, successfully building a new way of life in what may be very changed circumstances. In a word, they may display considerable resilience.

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