PTSD symptom severity relates to cognitive and psycho-social dysfunctioning - a study with Congolese refugees in Uganda

Background: In the ongoing conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), civilians have been heavily exposed to traumatic stressors. Traumatizing experiences cumulatively heighten the risk for trauma-related disorders, and with it affect cognitive and psycho-social functioning. Objectives:...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:European journal of psychotraumatology 2017-01, Vol.8 (1), p.1283086-10
Main Authors: Ainamani, Herbert E., Elbert, Thomas, Olema, David K., Hecker, Tobias
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Basic
Cognitive ability
Cognitive functioning
cognitive functions
Conflict
Domestic violence
DR Congo
Everyday life
Health problems
Memory
Mental disorders
Mental health
Neuropsychology
Post traumatic stress disorder
Poverty
Psychiatry
psycho-social functioning
PTSD
Refugees
Symptoms
Trauma
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Background: In the ongoing conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), civilians have been heavily exposed to traumatic stressors. Traumatizing experiences cumulatively heighten the risk for trauma-related disorders, and with it affect cognitive and psycho-social functioning. Objectives: We aimed at investigating the association between trauma-related disorders and cognitive and psycho-social functioning and hypothesized that PTSD symptom severity would negatively correlate with executive functioning, working memory and psycho-social functioning in everyday life. Method: In total, 323 Congolese refugees (mean age: 31.3 years) who arrived in the Ugandan Nakivale refugee settlement after January 2012 were assessed regarding their exposure to traumatic events, PTSD symptom severity (posttraumatic symptom scale interview), executive functioning (Tower of London), working memory performance (Corsi block tapping task) and psycho-social dysfunctioning (Luo functioning scale). Results: Hierarchical regression analyses indicated a significant negative association between PTSD symptom severity and working memory (β = -0.32, p 
ISSN:2000-8066
2000-8066
DOI:10.1080/20008198.2017.1283086