ABSTRACT
A new literature is emerging that describes psychic trauma in refugee children and adolescents. In the past decade, a number of studies have addressed the traumatic experiences of adolescent refugees subjected to war, famine, and political struggles in Cambodia, Vietnam, Tibet, and the countries of the former Yugoslavia (Kinzie et al., 1990; Sack et al., 1993; Mollica, Poole, and Son, 1997; Weine et al., 1998; Becker et al., 1999); Baum and Davidson (1986) studied the effects of humanmade disasters on children and adolescents and found that these effects can be more psychologically devastating than those of natural disasters. Sack, Seely, and Clarke (1997) found that the diagnosis of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in children and adolescents subjected to war transcends barriers of culture and language.
