ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses a number of critical variables focusing on the psychological, social, and interpersonal readjustment problems and needs of persons with strong ethnocultural identifications who suffer from traumatic stress following a catastrophic episode or episode pattern. The author believes that the intersecting point of ethnicity and traumatic stress needs to be understood in its synergistic impact upon the patient, as well as on the therapeutic process. Ethnicity shapes how the patient perceives, understands, accepts, and adapts to his or her traumatic stress pathology. Transethnic competency is thus essential, and there is the need for therapist awareness of the patient’s “cultural-behavioral norms,” as well as for overcoming ethnocentric views in their transcultural or transethnic interventions.
