Articles course Loss & Psychotrauma (201500816)
MSc. Clinical Psychology UU
2023-2024
Index
● Boelen, P. A., & Smid, G. E. (2017). Disturbed grief: Prolonged Grief Disorder (PGD) and
Persistent Complex Bereavement Disorder (PCBD). British Medical Journal, 357.
doi:10.1136/bmj.j2016. See this link.
● Stroebe, M.S., Schut, H.A.W. & Stroebe, W. (2007). The health consequences of
bereavement: A review. The Lancet, 370, 1960-1973. 10.1016/S0140-6736(07)61816-9. See
this link.
● Burback, L., Brémault-Philps S, Nijdam, M.J. , McFarlane A. & Vermetten, E. (2023) Treatment
of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: A state-of-the-art Review. See this link. Article sections 1; 2;
3; 4; 5.1; 5.2; 5.4; 6; 7
● Neuner, F., Elbert, T., & Schauer, M. (2020). Narrative exposure therapy for PTSD. In L. F.
Bufka, C. V. Wright, & R. W. Halfond (Eds.), Casebook to the APA Clinical Practice Guideline
for the treatment of PTSD (pp. 187–205). American Psychological Association.
https://doi.org/10.1037/0000196-009. Chapter will be made available on Blackboard (see
course content – workshops - workshop preparations – workshop Josita Versteeg)
● Stroebe, M.S., Schut, H.A.W. & Boerner, K. (2017). Models of coping with bereavement: An
updated overview. Studies in Psychology, 1-26. 10.1080/02109395.2017.1340055. See this
link.
● Boelen, P. A., Hout, M. v. d., & Bout, J. v. d. (2013). Prolonged grief disorder:
Cognitive-behavioral theory and therapy. In M. Stroebe, H. Schut, & J. van den Bout (Eds.),
Complicated grief: Scientific foundations for health care professionals (p. 221–234).
Routledge/Taylor & Francis Group. Chapter will be made available on Blackboard (see course
content - literature).
● Spuij, M., van Londen-Huiberts, A., & Boelen, P. A. (2013). Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy for
prolonged grief in children: Feasibility and multiple baseline study. Cognitive and Behavioral
Practice, 20, 349-361. See this link.
● Mogil, C., Hayal, N., Aralis, H., Paley, B., Milburn, N.G., Barrera, W., Kiff, C., Beardslee, W., &
Lester, P. (2022). A trauma-informed, family-centered, virtual home visiting program for
young children: One-year outcomes. Child Psychiatry & Human Development, 53, 964-979
(14 pag). See this link.
● Yohannan, J., Carlson, J.S., & Volker, M.A. (2021). Cognitive behavioral treatments for
children and adolescents exposed to traumatic events: A meta-analysis examining variables
moderating treatment outcomes. Journal of Traumatic Stress (12 pag),
https://doi.org/10.1002/jts.22755. See this link.
● Lechner-Meichsner, F., Ehring, T., Krüger-Gottschalk, A., Morina, N., Plankl, C., & Steil, R.
(2022). Using imagery rescripting to treat posttraumatic stress disorder in refugees: A Case
Study. Cognitive and Behavioral Practice. doi: 10.1016/j.cbpra.2022.06.002. See this link.
● Boterhoven de Haan, K. L., Lee, C. W., Fassbinder, E., van Es, S. M., Menninga, S., Meewisse,
M.-L., Rijkeboer, M., Kousemaker, M., & Arntz, A. (2020). Imagery rescripting and eye
movement desensitisation and reprocessing as treatment for adults with post-traumatic
1
, stress disorder from childhood trauma: Randomised clinical trial. The British Journal of
Psychiatry, 217 (5), 609–615. https://doi.org/10.1192/bjp.2020.158. See this link.
● Covers, Karst & Bicanic (2022) Development of multidisciplinary sexual assault centers in the
Netherlands, European journal of psychotraumatology, 13:2, 2127475. See this link.
● Dworkin, E. R., Ojalehto, H. J., Brill, C. D., Fitzpatrick, S., Bedard-Gilligan, M. A., & Kaysen, D.
(2019). Understanding PTSD and sexual assault. In Handbook of Sexual Assault and Sexual
Assault Prevention (pp. 293-307). Cham: Springer International Publishing. See this link.
● Johannsen, M., Damholdt, M. F., Zachariae, R., Lundorff, M., Farver-Vestergaard, I., &
O'Connor, M. (2019). Psychological interventions for grief in adults: A systematic review and
meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials. Journal of Affective Disorders, 253, 69–86.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jad.2019.04.065. See this link.
● Maciejewski, P. K., Falzarano, F. B., She, W. J., Lichtenthal, W. G., & Prigerson, H. G. (2022). A
micro-sociological theory of adjustment to loss. Current Opinion in Psychology, 43, 96–101.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2021.06.016. See this link.
● Patanè, M., Ghane, S., Karyotaki, E., Cuijpers, P., Schoonmade, L., Tarsitani, L., & Sijbrandij, M.
(2022). Prevalence of mental disorders in refugees and asylum seekers: A systematic review
and meta-analysis. Global Mental Health, 1-14. doi:10.1017/gmh.2022.29. See this link.
● Turrini, G., Tedeschi, F., Cuijpers, P., Del Giovane, C., Kip, A., Morina, N., Nosè, M., Ostuzzi, G.,
Purgato, M., Ricciardi, C., Sijbrandij, M., Tol, W., & Barbui, C. (2021). A network meta-analysis
of psychosocial interventions for refugees and asylum seekers with PTSD. BMJ Global Health,
6(6), e005029. See this link.
● Killikelly, C., Bauer, S., & Maercker, A. (2018). The assessment of grief in refugees and
postconflict survivors: a narrative review of etic and emic research. Frontiers in Psychology, 9.
doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01957. See this link.
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,Narrative Exposure Therapy for PTSD.
Like other trauma-focused procedures, NET’s aim is to change the structure of trauma-related
memories, cognitions, and emotions related to the traumatic events. Narrative exposure therapy
(NET) is a brief treatment (i.e., 6–16 sessions, depending on the setting) of complex PTSD that results
from exposure to multiple traumatic events.
In NET, the client, empathically guided by the therapist, creates a written autobiography containing
major emotional memories from birth to the present. This process occurs within a predetermined
number of sessions, each about 90 minutes in duration. The focus of NET is on reconstructing the
fragmented memories of traumatic experiences into coherent narrations that are connected to the
temporal and spatial context of the lifetime periods. At the end of treatment, a copy of the final
consistent life narration is handed over to the client, and the therapist keeps one copy that may,
depending on the wishes of the client, be used for human rights purposes.
NET differs from other trauma-focused psychotherapy methods in some fundamental ways. It was
originally developed for resource-poor settings in conflict areas. Part of the pragmatism involved in
NET is that the procedure can be applied across contexts and cultures with limited adaptations. This
principle is based on the assumption that, with some cultural particularities in the expression of
symptoms, trauma reactions are universal phenomena as they result from innate neurobiological
processes involved in the memories of threat and stress. At the same time, sharing one’s histories is a
personal and cultural practice that helps the survivor to cope with life events and to foster
interpersonal closeness.
the unique feature of NET is the life-span approach. Most trauma-focused treatments require the
client to identify the event that he or she experienced as most traumatic, often referred to as the
index trauma. However, victims of wars and persecution have typically experienced a series of
traumatic events rather than a single traumatic stressor; thus, whole periods of life may have
traumatized a survivor. A key assumption of NET is that the distorted memory representation of the
accumulation of aversive events and conditions over the life-span, rather than a single index trauma
memory, maintains posttraumatic stress symptoms. The life-span approach seeks to integrate a
course of aversive and traumatic memories into a meaningful autobiographic memory
representation, which is a key requisite of identity and self-acceptance.
The aim of NET is to reestablish a consistent autobiographical context of the traumatic events and to
reconnect the context to the threat structure—in colloquial terms, to tie cold memories around hot
memories, defined by their sensory representations. Therefore, the client, with the assistance of the
therapist, constructs a chronological narrative of her or his life story with a focus on the traumatic
experiences. Within a predefined period, usually about four to fourteen 90-minute sessions, the
fragmented reports of the traumatic experiences will be transformed into a coherent narrative that is
documented in written form. This procedure involves the reconstruction of a meaningful narrative
for the client that is compatible with realistic and adaptive self-representations.
Neurobiological memory rationale
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, NET is based on memory theories of PTSD, which assume that PTSD is maintained by a dissociation of
associative and contextual memory of traumatic events. Current neuropsychological theories of PTSD
share the assumption that the disorder is caused and maintained by memory processes. Emotional
experiences are represented in episodic memory, which consists of associative networks (also
referred to as situationally accessible memory, hot memory, fear structure, or s-rep) that are tied to
verbally coded contextual information (similar concepts have been referred to as verbally accessible
memory, cold memory, or c-rep. Neurocognitive processes that occur due to extreme stress during
traumatic events cause a dissociation of the associative memories from their context, and that
dissociation finally results in PTSD symptoms.
The threat networks
Threat networks represent vivid memories of traumatic events as associative networks of the
sensory, cognitive, emotional, and physiological details of the traumatic situations. The sensory
elements contain stimuli of the situation that signaled threat (e.g., a gun or injury) as well as neutral
and everyday stimuli that happened to be present during the traumatic event. A widespread
activation of the threat network can occur from the activation of single elements of the association
through an environmental stimulus or internal cue. Such an intense activation results in experiences
of intrusive reliving and flashbacks. Depending on the peritraumatic experience, threat networks may
include the full cascade of defensive reactions, such as alarm (fight–flight) responses, stages of tonic
immobility, or shut-down reactions, with a decrease of sympathetic and an increase in
parasympathetic arousal. Associative learning is not restricted to learning stimulus and response
elements; it also involves coding the temporal and spatial context of the event (waar, wat? Een rat
kan in de ene doos bang zijn voor een schok, in de andere niet). Autobiographic memory is the basis
for a narrative account of event and, because of the tight connection to self-representations,
provides information about the meaning of the event in a life-span perspective.
Disconnection of Threat Structure From Context Memory
Stress hormones have a substantial impact on the coding and consolidation of human memory. High
levels of adrenaline, noradrenaline, and cortisol cause opposing effects for declarative and
nondeclarative memory processes, resulting in augmented associative but fragmented contextual
representations. As a consequence, traumatic experiences are represented in excessive threat
structures that are only loosely tied to autobiographic information. The key assumption of the
memory theory is that the dissociation of the associative network from context memory causes PTSD
symptoms. The lack of accompanying temporal and spatial context information results in a “here and
now” sensation of the recollection of the traumatic event. It feels as if the event is happening again,
and the memory activation involves the perception of current threat. At the same time, the
disorganized autobiographic memory results in disorganized narrations of the traumatic events,
which contribute to the maintenance of PTSD symptoms. Because autobiographic memory and
self-representations are intricately connected, the weak contextual memory of the traumatic event
involves an inconsistency in the representation of the meaning of the event. Self-representations
about a person’s safety, trust, intimacy, responsibility, or even the whole identity are poorly
elaborated and integrated.
Results from more than a dozen randomized controlled trials in adults (up to 75 years) and children
and adolescents (from 7 years on) have demonstrated that, within a limited number of sessions, NET
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