ABSTRACT

The impact of war on children has also attracted the attention of the research community. Kinzie, Sack, Angell, Manson, and Rath (1986) followed up children who had experienced war trauma, 4 years after they left Cambodia, and found that 50% had developed PTSD and mild but prolonged depression. In a 15-year followup of 59 Cambodian young adults, Hubbard, Realmuto, Northwood, and Masten (1995) established a prevalence of 24 % for PTSD, and a lifetime prevalence of 59 % for the same disorder. Nader, Pynoos, Fairbanks, Al-Ajeel, and Al-Asfour (1993), in a study of Kuwaiti children following the Gulf War, found that 70 % reported moderate to severe post-traumatic stress reactions. Weine et al. (1995) established PTSD in 25% and depression in 17 % of a small sample of Bosnian adolescents who had moved to America during the Yugoslavian war, and Ahmad (1992) found the same rate in displaced Kurdish children. Although depressive symptoms were equally elevated in Croatian children during the war, displaced (refugee) children reported more sadness and fear than local children, who had not moved from their home residence (Zivcic, 1993).