Working memory and emotional interpretation bias in a sample of Syrian refugee adolescents.
Eur Child Adolesc Psychiatry
; 30(12): 1885-1894, 2021 Dec.
Article
em En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-33025075
ABSTRACT
The number of adolescent refugees around the world has been continuously increasing over the past few years trying to escape war and terror, among other things. Such experience not only increases the risk for mental health problems including anxiety, depression, and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), but also may have implications for socio-cognitive development. This study tested cognitive-affective processing in refugee adolescents who had escaped armed conflict in Syria and now resided in Istanbul, Turkey. Adolescents were split into a high trauma (n = 31, 12 girls, mean age = 11.70 years, SD = 1.15 years) and low trauma (n = 27, 14 girls, mean age = 11.07 years, SD = 1.39 years) symptom group using median split, and performed a working memory task with emotional distraction to assess cognitive control and a surprise faces task to assess emotional interpretation bias. The results indicated that high (vs. low) trauma symptom youth were ~ 20% worse correctly remembering the spatial location of a cue, although both groups performed at very low levels. However, this finding was not modulated by emotion. In addition, although all youths also had a ~ 20% bias toward interpreting ambiguous (surprise) faces as more negative, the high (vs. low) symptom youth were faster when allocating such a face to the positive (vs. negative) emotion category. The findings suggest the impact of war-related trauma on cognitive-affective processes essential to healthy development.
Palavras-chave
Texto completo:
1
Coleções:
01-internacional
Base de dados:
MEDLINE
Assunto principal:
Refugiados
/
Transtornos de Estresse Pós-Traumáticos
Tipo de estudo:
Diagnostic_studies
Limite:
Adolescent
/
Child
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Female
/
Humans
País/Região como assunto:
Asia
Idioma:
En
Ano de publicação:
2021
Tipo de documento:
Article