Esa Palosaari

Post traumatic cognitions (PTCs) are important determinants of post traumatic stress symptoms (PTS symptoms). We tested whether risk factors of PTS symptoms (trauma, demographics, social and family-related factors) predict PTCs and whether PTCs mediate the association between risk factors and PTS symptoms among war-affected children. The participan...

We tested the hypothesis that intergenerational effects of parents' war trauma on offspring's attachment and mental health are mediated by psychological maltreatment. Two hundred and forty children and their parents were sampled from a war-prone area, Gaza, Palestine. The parents reported the number and type of traumatic experiences of war they had...

In a longitudinal study of war-affected children, we tested, first, whether posttraumatic cognitions (PTCs) mediated the relationship between initial and later posttraumatic stress symptoms (PTSSs). Second, we analyzed the relative strength of influences that PTCs and PTSSs have on each other in cross-lagged models of levels and latent change score...

Objective: Research shows great individual variation in changes in posttraumatic stress symptoms (PTSSs) after major traumas of terrorist attacks, military combat, and natural disasters. Earlier studies have identified specific mental health trajectories both in children and adults. This study aimed, first, to identify potential PTSS-related traje...

We examined the effectiveness of a psychosocial intervention in reducing mental health symptoms among war-affected children, and the role of peritraumatic dissociation in moderating the intervention impact on posttraumatic stress symptoms (PTSS). School classes were randomized into intervention (n = 242) and waitlist control (n = 240) conditions in...

Keskustelua toistettavuuskriisistä.

We identified the Twitter accounts of 941 climate change policy actors across nine countries, and collected their activities from 2017--2022, totalling 48 million activities from 17,700 accounts at different organizational levels. There is considerable temporal and cross-national variation in how prominent climate-related activities were, but all n...

On social media, the boundaries between people's private and public lives often blur. The need to navigate both roles, which are governed by distinct norms, impacts how individuals conduct themselves online, and presents methodological challenges for researchers. We conduct a systematic exploration on how an organization's official Twitter accounts...

Despite 70 years of research, there is no consensus about the effects of threat messages on behavior, partly because of publication bias. The lack of consensus concerns situations such as climate change where people tend to believe that they cannot easily make a major difference. Using a 2 × 2, (threat, neutral) × (efficacy, no efficacy) between-su...

We ask how state empathy, trait empathy, and role awareness influence dictator game giving in a monetarily incentivized experiment. We manipulated two factors: role awareness (role certainty vs. role uncertainty) and state empathy induction (no empathy induction vs. empathy induction). Under role uncertainty, participants did not know their role as...

Background The latest version of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD‐11) proposes a posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) diagnosis reduced to its core symptoms within the symptom clusters re‐experiencing, avoidance and hyperarousal. Since children and adolescents often show a variety of internalizing and externalizing symptoms in the...

Mental health problems are common in war-affected areas, but children have different levels of vulnerability. Based on ecological theory (Bronfenbrenner, 2005), this study analyses how factors related to the child (cognitive capacity), their family (parental depression and parenting styles), and their school (teachers' practices and peer relations)...

Evidence is emerging that the emotional quality of parenting may shape the development of children’s executive functions (EF). Such an effect may be especially pronounced among high-risk children due to the stress-buffering effects of supportive parenting. However, most previous studies have focused on parenting in early childhood. We test whether...

This study examined (1) how attachment style predicts changes in mental health, and (2) whether change in emotion regulation (ER) intensity mediates that association in the context of psychosocial intervention among war-affected children. Participants were 482 Palestinian children whose school classes were randomized to either intervention (Teachin...

Abstract Effective emotion regulation (ER) is expected to protect mental health in traumatic stress. We first analysed the protective (moderator) function of different ER strategies and the associations between ER and mental health. Second, we tested gender differences in the protective function of ER and the associations between ER strategies and...

Effective emotion regulation (ER) is expected to protect mental health in traumatic stress. We first analysed the protective (moderator) function of different ER strategies and the associations between ER and mental health. Second, we tested gender differences in the protective function of ER and the associations between ER strategies and mental he...

Whether economic growth improves subjective well-being has been under debate. Studies that find such an association also document heterogeneity between countries in the magnitude of the relationship. We test a theoretical model in which economic growth enhances subjective well-being only when a large share of the population derives their subjective...

We examined, first, what kind of dreams can protect children’s mental health from impacts of war trauma, and, second, analyzed whether a psychosocial intervention (Teaching Recovery Techniques [TRT]) is effective in changing dream characteristics (e.g., bizarreness, emotional valence, and the dreamer’s role) to be more beneficial or functional. Dre...

Abstract Social resources are considered important protectors in traumatic conditions, but few studies have analyzed their role in psychosocial interventions among war-affected children. We examined (1) whether a psychosocial intervention (teaching recovery techniques, TRT) is effective in improving peer and sibling relations, and (2) whether these...

Punamäki, R.L. Quota, S., Peltonen, K., Diab, M., & Palosaari, E. Palestinian women’s parenting beliefs and their associations with traumatic experiences. Family approach in war trauma: role of the attachment security in intervention among Palestinian children.

The study examines, first, the effectiveness of a psychosocial intervention based on Teaching Recovery Techniques (TRT) to increase resiliency among Palestinian children, exposed to a major trauma of war. Second, it analyses the role of family factors (maternal attachment and family atmosphere) as moderating the intervention impacts on resilience....

Parent-child relationship is created already in prenatal fantasies and expectations of the child-to-be. Negative violation of these expectations after the child is born is known to be harmful for the parent-child relationship. Yet, research is scarce about the medical and psychological factors contributing to violated expectations (VE). This study...

Social resources are considered important protectors in traumatic conditions, but few studies have analyzed their role in psychosocial interventions among war-affected children. We examined (1) whether a psychosocial intervention (teaching recovery techniques, TRT) is effective in improving peer and sibling relations, and (2) whether these potentia...

Within the last 10 years, the concepts of risk and resilience have become more common in the intervention literature. In this chapter, we would like to draw from a wide array of literature to help intervention planners and researchers find suitable and effective methods for enhancing resilience.

We tested whether negative trauma-related cognitions predict post-traumatic stress reactions (PTSR) and whether changes in cognitions mediate the effectiveness of a cognitive-behavioural group intervention in reducing PTSR among war-traumatised children. The intervention was based on the Teaching Recovery Techniques manual. The sample consisted of...

Effectiveness of Psychosocial Intervention Among War-Traumatized Children: Mental Health and Socio-Emotional Development: A Cluster Randomized Controlled Study War trauma forms severe risks for child well-being and development. Fortunately, there are a number of interventions to help war-traumatized children that involve both therapeutic and resili...