Abstract
As a result of frequent exposure to trauma, aid workers are at high risk for negative psychological symptoms. Training specifically geared at fostering critical incident self-efficacy in humanitarian aid workers may bolster critical incident self-efficacy as well as general self-efficacy as they relate to experiences of traumatic symptomatology and resilience. Sixty-three aid workers completed questionnaires regarding efficacy, resilience, coping, and posttraumatic stress symptomatology at baseline, and 46 aid workers completed the same measures after the training workshop. Multiple regression analysis indicated that higher levels of self-efficacy related to higher resilience levels. General self-efficacy and critical incident coping self-efficacy (CICSE) were stronger after the training, even when controlling for histories of trauma. Histories of trauma contributed significant variance to CICSE before the training but were insignificant after the training. These findings suggest that aid organizations can support their workers by providing training that promotes resilience through enhancing efficacies.
Highlights
Aid workers experience continuous, episodic, personal, communal, and vicarious trauma
Many are resilient, overcoming traumatic symptomatology at least partially because they have a sense of self-efficacy, which is defined as the belief in one’s ability to cope with traumatic situations (Benight & Bandura, 2004)
Variables that correlated at zero order with general self-efficacy measure (GSE) and critical incident coping self-efficacy (CICSE) were entered at step 1
Summary
A sense of general self-efficacy enables people to interpret situations as challenging rather than stressful (Ebstrup et al, 2011), and yet, no researchers far have examined the value of self-efficacy to help humanitarian aid workers become more resilient. Some aid workers reside in war torn areas with threats of bombs, targeted attacks, and kidnappings, and others help in natural disasters, where cultural and physical isolation can contribute to their vulnerability (McFarlane, 2004), as can separation from their family (Connorton et al, 2012). In the context of complex humanitarian emergencies, aid workers may experience the stress of having to perform duties that they were not trained to perform (e.g., Ager et al, 2012). Sexual violence, which predominantly affects women, can be perpetrated from within as well as without (Stoddard et al, 2019)
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