| Abstract [eng] |
War refugees frequently experience traumatic events that could negatively affect not only themselves but also the people who provide service to them – war refugee helpers could experience secondary traumatic stress related to the aid recipient trauma. The correlational study was conducted to identify war refugee support providers' risk and protective factors of secondary traumatic stress. The study included 120 professionals and volunteers who provide various types of help to war refugees in Lithuania or provided service in the past, their ages ranged from 18 to 74 years (M = 42,5, SD = 12,7), 90,8% of the sample were female. Secondary traumatic stress was evaluated by the Secondary Traumatic Stress Scale (STSS), the Professional Quality of Life Scale (ProQOL) was used to measure burnout and compassion satisfaction, to measure a personal history of trauma the Life Events Checklist for DSM-5 Standard Version (LEC - 5) was selected, self-care was measured by the Self Care Assessment Worksheet (SCAW). Social support was measured by the Momina Khalid Butt (2023) self-constructed questions. The results of the study revealed that 19,17% of participants experienced secondary traumatic stress. The level of secondary traumatic stress was not related to personal history of trauma, type of help, or clients, work experience, and workload but was positively associated with burnout and negatively related to compassion satisfaction, self-care, and social support. Furthermore, it was found that burnout is a key prognostic factor of secondary traumatic stress, and higher compassion satisfaction, self-care, and social support predict lower secondary traumatic stress indirectly - through a lower level of burnout. These results provide more insight into the possible direction of secondary traumatic stress prevention and intervention among war refugee support providers in Lithuania. Burnout should be given the most attention to prevent war refugee helpers‘ secondary traumatic stress. |
