GC-TS Student Section

For the younger generation it may be even more important to find global connections and work together on topics that we can better address together. Students checkout Student page on the GC-TS website and feel welcome to join or reach out to other students involved.

A student committee with excellent student leaders has been created who will act as a liaison between students and the GC-TS steering committee and oversee all student projects. 
 

Student projects committee members:

• Krithika Prakash (chair) - representing North America and Australia/New Zealand areas

• Yuhang Zhu - representing Asia

• Katherine Soto - representing South America

• Engida Girma Gebiso - representing Africa

• Heike Arzapalo - representing Europe

If you have any further questions or concerns, please reach out to Krithika Prakash: kprakash@emich.edu

Free access to a GC-TS partner conference 

For our global members working on GC-TS projects several Traumatic Stress Societies have offered conference registration waivers for their annual meetings. 

Congratulations to our first GC-TS awardees:

• Dany Laure Wadji (Cameroon)

• Indira Pramasari (Indonesia)

who have been awarded with a registration waiver for the ISTSS annual meeting in Atlanta, November 2022.

Check out for which upcoming conference you can apply for a waiver!

Text mining to improve screening for trauma-related symptoms in a global sample

Imagine we would only need a few words from people describing their stressful events to assess their risk of PTSD? 

In this global collaboration project Marengo et al. (2022) used existing FAIR data from a cross-national sample of 5048 respondents who filled out the  Global Psychotrauma Screen (GPS). Text-mining was applied to the short textual descriptions of stressful events in the GPS.

Extracted language features were examined as predictors of trauma-related symptoms. Combining language data and self-report information (e.g., demographics) resulted in a model which achieved good accuracy as a screener for probable PTSD diagnosis. Overall, results indicated that even short texts (up to 4 words) add to the detection of probable PTSD.

Trauma and ageing position paper

An international network of experts on trauma and ageing has been created and have met to determine the research agenda. This is to be laid down in a position paper. The focus will be on:

• trauma and ageing mechanisms 

• epidemiology, screening and assessment

• treatment and care

   

We would welcome more expertise from non-Western countries, please contact Sjacko Sobczak if you would like to join.

Student project: paper in a day

Paper in a Day Projects (PIAD)

For early career researchers there is a unique opportunity to collaborate with international colleagues on existing data and to write a manuscript to be submitted for publication ‘in a day’.

There will be two PIAD projects hosted by ISTSS this year:

1) An Exploration of Trauma-Related Symptoms and Symptom Patterns Across the World  

Project leaders: Hope Christie & Anke de Haan 

2) A Qualitative Analysis of the role of PTSD and PTG in Family Experiences of having a relative in Vegetative and Minimally Conscious States

Project leaders: Anna Denejkina & Yaara Sadeh

FUTURE

The FUTURE network has further expanded by welcoming new researchers and clinicians involved in the area of refugee mental health and traumatic stress worldwide. The first FUTURE network meeting will be online in autumn. A date is currently being set amongst the members. In addition, during the ISTSS meeting in Atlanta a more informal in-person gathering with members will be planned. The goal of these meetings is to get familiar with the work and background of each of the members and to brainstorm about plans for collaboration in the near future.

More mental health researchers or practitioners interested in joining the FUTURE network are welcome. Please contact Anke Witteveen.  

Socio-emotional development across cultures

This theme aims to improve social well-being in individuals affected by child maltreatment. It was initiated in the fall of 2019 and since then has grown into a large group of more than 50 members from various countries, representing Asia, Europe, Africa, North and South America, and Australia. Check out our latest publication, describing the research agenda of the theme.
 

Currently two projects are in progress: 

Child Maltreatment through a Cross-Cultural Lens which, e.g., explores cross-cultural variations in what constitutes child maltreatment and how parenting behaviors impact children’s development

Child Maltreatment and Preferred Interpersonal Distance assessing whether adults exposed to child maltreatment prefer larger social distances across cultures. 

Check out the website if you like to join this thriving group!

Ministry of Health and Welfare – KSTSS performed COVID-19 related Mental Health Survey for Q2, 2022

The Ministry of Health and Welfare and the Korean Society for Traumatic Studies (KSTSS) released the results of a mental health survey related to COVID-19 for the second quarter of 2022. The results showed that the fear, anxiety, and depression experienced by the public were declining, but suicidal thoughts were on the rise because of economic difficulties and isolation. 

Successful JSTSS 21st Annual Meeting

The annual meeting of JSTSS was held in Tokyo on July 23 and 24, and more than 750 people attended (hybrid meeting). The highlight of the meeting was the invited lecture on the theme of the war disaster and trauma. Following a report on the current situation in Ukraine via video message from Natalia Nalyvaiko (the board member of ESTSS), Prof. Jana D.Javakhishvili (the past president of ESTSS) gave a video presentation on the history of war damage and mental health needs and support in Georgia and Ukraine. A live discussion session via zoom was also held. 

ESTSS is preparing for the 17th biennial conference

The ESTSS is in the process of preparing the ESTSS 17th biennial conference which will be hosted by UKPTS in Belfast, on June 14-17, 2023. The topic of the conference is “Trauma and resilience through the ages: A life course perspective”. It will be the first bi-annual meeting since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic and we hope that our professional family will enjoy in-person gathering.

ESTSS is continuing activities focused at supporting Ukraine and USOCTE in responding to the severe mental health and psychosocial crisis related to the Russian invasion of Ukraine and ongoing war. The Ukraine Certification task force is in a process of delivering training for trainers for the core group of mental health professionals to assure further quality dissemination of the training. The “Helping the Helpers“ initiative – an expert-guided supervision and intervision project, supporting the Ukrainian community of mental health professionals is continuing.
 

DeGPT’s annual conference postponed to 2023

The annual conference of the German-speaking Society of Traumatic Stress Studies (DeGPT) was postponed from 2022 to 2023 and will take place in Zurich, Switzerland, on February 16-18. The conference topic will be “Trauma in a digital world - from cyber-trauma to digital therapy”. 

DeGPT continues to work on the improvement of the situation of traumatized individuals in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland with various task forces. We look forward to getting together again in person in Zurich next year.

ISTSS updates

Early bird discounted registration for the in-person ISTSS 38th Annual Meeting, November 9-12, 2022, at the Atlanta Marriott Marquis in Atlanta, Georgia, USA, is now open through September 5, 2022. Late-breaking Annual Meeting poster abstract submissions will be open from September 1-15, 2022.

Please consider submitting your work for review. Visit the Annual Meeting web page for complete registration details and to submit late-breaking poster abstracts. Finally, the ISTSS President-Elect and Board election is now open through September 28, 2022. All ISTSS members are eligible to vote and should have received an email with election log-in credentials. Please direct any election questions to Tonya Cabrera at ISTSS headquarters.