Twenty-five years later: A limited study of the sequelae of the concentration camp experience

Abstract

The central question raised is: To what extent does maladaptation and malfunctioning characterize survivors of the unimaginably extreme, prolonged trauma of the Nazi concentration camps, and to what extent do we find successful adaptation among such persons? The extensive literature on camp survivors is largely incapable of confronting this question. Even when not based only on a small number of patients in psychiatric treatment, most papers deal with select populations. Moreover, it is seldom that survivors are compared to appropriate controls. - A study which included Israeli women aged 45–54 of Central European birth and focused on problems of adaptation to climacterium provided data relevant to the central question. The respondents constituted a representative sample of all women in a middle-sized Israeli city meeting the criteria of age and nativity. Of the 287 women in the sample, 77 had been in a Nazi concentration camp during World War II. The remaining 210 women were used as a control group. - Adaptation was measured from several different points of view: menopausal symptomatology, the subjective sense of wellbeing, physical and emotional health status, and role satisfaction. The detailed data show camp survivors to be more poorly-adjusted than the controls. - Of greater import, however, is the fact that a not-inconsiderable number of concentration camp survivors were found to be well-adapted, despite the extreme trauma. It is suggested that this finding requires serious investigation. Three complementary explanations of the fact of successful adaptation are proposed: an initial underlying strength, a subsequent environment which provided opportunities to reestablish a satisfying and meaningful existence, and a “hardening” process which allow the survivor to view current stresses with some equanimity.”