Lucia De Haene

Adult attachment in the context of refugee traumatisation: the impact of organized violence and forced separation on parental states of mind regarding attachment

Starting from an outline of the refugee experience as a process of cumulative traumatisation, we review research literature on mental health outcomes in refugees. Next, an integration of findings on relational processes in refugee families documents the role of the family unit as a key interactive context patterning the impact of sequential traumatisation. Relating these trauma- and migration-specific family processes to their central dimension of provision or disruption of emotional availability in a context of chronic adversity, we aim to explore the development of unresolved and insecure parental states of mind regarding attachment during forced migration. Starting the research report, a method discussion on the administration of 11 Adult Attachment Interviews with adult refugees as part of an explorative multiple case study integrates deontological and technical reflections on the use of the Adult Attachment Interview in a context of ongoing traumatisation. The paper then presents findings on adult attachment in refugees and highlights representational processes involved in the potential disruption of caregiver availability during refugee traumatisation.

Toward a Relational Understanding of the Reintegration and Rehabilitation Processes of Former Child Soldiers

Worldwide, about 250,000 children are employed in armed factions. Their time in the army or rebel group charges them with a range of difficult and possibly traumatizing experiences. Moreover, when returning from the armed group, they often encounter difficulties reintegrating into their community and familial context, in particular social processes of stigmatization, discrimination, and expulsion. This article frames these difficulties within the broader social context, where organized violence induces deeply rooted processes of collective trauma on entire communities. Elaborating on diverse initiatives supporting the rehabilitation and reintegration processes of former child soldiers, a relational approach is put forward to address possible gaps in current humanitarian approaches. Additionally, current gaps and possible ways forward in research studying this group, starting from a relational approach, are discussed.

“If We Can’t Do It, Our Children Will Do It One Day” A Qualitative Study of West African Immigrant Parents’ Losses and Educational Aspirations for Their Children

This study examined migration narratives of West African immigrants for the connections between experiences of loss and educational aspirations for their children. The qualitative design consisted of three interviews per family in which parents (N = 20, 12 families) were asked to narrate their families’ migration histories. Transcripts were analyzed using grounded theory followed by thematic coding. Discussions of loss were markedly proximal to discussions of children’s education. Schooling was described as providing upward mobility but conflicting with education at home, which was seen as fostering traditional values. Discussion contextualizes findings using Hobfoll’s conservation of resources theory and Kagitçibasi’s family change theory. Implications include salience of loss to educational aspirations and school-family partnerships for immigrants.

Intercultural therapy and the limitations of a cultural competency framework: about cultural differences, universalities and the unresolvable tensions between them

Working with a family from a cultural background other than one’s own is considered to be challenging for the therapist. Influenced by social constructionism, the family therapy field highlights the importance of contingency and cultural differences and therapists are encouraged to develop their cultural competency in order to deal with these differences. In this article, starting from contemporary critiques of notions of Western societies’ cultural diversity, we address the way in which the cultural competency framework, by highlighting the importance of cultural differences and the therapist’s culture-specific knowledge, may underestimate the importance of the social dimensions of the issues involved. Furthermore, highlighting cultural differences may obscure the shared humanity present in a transcultural encounter. In this article, as an alternative to the cultural competency framework, we propose a view of intercultural family therapy in which the unresolvable dialectical tension between differences and universalities is central.

Cross-cultural validation of the child abuse potential inventory in Belgium (Flanders): Relations with demographic characteristics and parenting problems

This study examined the reliability and the validity of the Dutch CAP Inventory, a screening instrument that measures parents’ potential for child physical abuse (Milner, The Child Abuse Potential Inventory: Manual (2nd ed.), Psytec, Webster, NC, 1986). The CAP Inventory and measures on parenting stress and parents’ emotions and attributions with regard to childrearing were administered in a nonclinical sample of randomly selected mothers (N = 362) with a 4-to-11-year-old child. The CAP Inventory Abuse scale showed high internal consistency and split-half reliability. Twenty-four CAP Inventories (6.6%) were invalid, because mothers tended to present themselves either as too good or too bad. Sixteen valid CAP Inventories (4.4%) were indicative of high potential for abuse. Scores on the Abuse scale were significantly predicted by an external locus of control with regard to childrearing and by high levels of parenting stress. Results supported the cross-cultural generalizability of the CAP Inventory Abuse scale.

Adolescents Lived Experiences of Close Relationships in the Context of Transnational Families: A Qualitative Study From Ecuador

Although transnational migration and its impact on families and society has received considerable attention from scholars, still little is known about its effects on the family members who stay in their home country. The aim of this qualitative study was to explore adolescents’ experiences of close relationships in the context of transnational migration. The study was based on in-depth interviews with male and female adolescents whose parents had migrated. For administration of these interviews, a tool consisting of 15 pieces of wood was developed in order to invite participants to represent family members in an expressive modality that could facilitate discussion and decrease tension provoked by parental migration. Thematic analysis showed that adolescents experienced growing up within tri-generational families whose structure and dynamics allow for a sense of stability. In these families, adolescents experience meaningful relationships that are important sources of support to cope with the delicate emotional situation inherent in transnational families. However, the present study also revealed that adolescents experience the relationship with their migrant parents as a recurrent source of distress and emotional ambivalence, leading to a potential perspective on the parent-child separation in the context of transnational migration as an experience of an ambiguous loss.

Unraveling the Mobilization of Memory in Research With Refugees

In this article, we explore how narrative accounts of trauma are co-constructed through the interaction between researcher and participant. Using a narrative multiple-case study with Kurdish refugee families, we address how this process takes place, investigating how researcher and participants were engaged in relational, moral, collective, and sociopolitical dimensions of remembering, and how this led to the emergence of particular ethical questions. Case examples indicate that acknowledging the multilayered co-construction of remembering in the research relationship profoundly complicates existing deontological guidelines that predominantly emphasize the researcher’s responsibility in sensitively dealing with participants’ alleged autobiographical trauma narratives. Instead, our analysis invites qualitative researchers to engage in a continued, context-specific ethical reflection on the potential risks and benefits that are invoked in studies with survivors of collective violence.

‘Behind every stone awaits an Alexander’: unravelling the limits of participation within micro and macro dramaturgy of participatory refugee theatre

ABSTRACT In this article, we question the unilateral discourse of benefit of participation in participatory refugee theatre in the context of a growing socio-political climate of polarisation and stigmatisation of refugees in European countries of resettlement. By integrating critical voices from the fields of applied theatre and refugee research, we analyse the micro and macro dramaturgy of a Berlin-based participatory refugee theatre project. Through this analysis, we explore how refugees’ participation entails opportunities for empowerment, agency and giving voice, but also risks disempowerment and silencing in the interconnected relations between the participant, theatre maker, audience and the broader socio-political context.

Refugees in Europe: Educational policies and practices as spaces of hospitality?

Introduction for the special issue Refugees in Europe: Educational policies and practices as spaces of hospitality? of the European Education Research Journal

Stories of trauma in family therapy with refugees: Supporting safe relational spaces of narration and silence:

With the sharp increase of refugees’ arrival and resettlement in western communities, adequate mental health care forms a pivotal dimension in host societies’ responses to those individuals and communities seeking protection within their borders. Here, clinical literature shows a growing interest in the development of family therapy approaches with refugees, in which therapeutic practice engages with the pivotal role of refugee family dynamics in posttrauma reconstruction and adaptation in resettlement and aims at supporting posttrauma reconstruction through strengthening capacities to restore safety, meaning and connectedness within family relationships. In this article, we focus on the narrative restoration of meaning as central mode of posttrauma reparation and explore its specific dynamics and relational complexities in the context of therapeutic practice with refugee families. Hereto, we integrate theoretical and clinical scholarly work on trauma narration and its intersection with empirical findings on trauma communication in refugee families. Furthermore, we develop case reflections to illustrate different processes of engaging with trauma narration in refugee family therapy. This analysis develops an understanding of the multivoiced ways in which refugee families engage with traumatic suffering through different modes of expression that may entail both narration and silence and explores how family therapeutic practices can engage and mobilize voices of narration and silence as relational stories of restoration.