Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is a disorder that develops in people who have experienced a shocking, scary, or dangerous event. When most people think about PTSD they think about soldiers who’ve gone to war and have experienced warfare, but the fact is that there is a bigger issue surrounding PTSD at home that no one is talking about—immigration.
There are approximately 55 million Hispanics in the U.S. and about 35% of those are immigrants. A study published by The Center for Migration Studies of New York by Krista M. Perreira and India Ornelas studied 281 foreign-born adolescents and their parents to see how the migration process influences the risk of experiencing trauma and developing PTSD.
They found that 29% of foreign-born adolescents and 34% foreign-born parents experienced trauma during the migration process. Among those that experienced trauma, 9% of adolescents and 21% of their parents were at risk for PTSD. On top of that, pre-migration poverty combined with clandestine entry into the U.S. increased the risk of trauma and the subsequent development of PTSD symptoms. Post-migration experiences of discrimination and neighborhood disorder further increased this risk, while social support and familism mitigated it.
According to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), the risk for PTSD is separated into three categories, including pre-traumatic, peri-traumatic, and post-traumatic factors:
Peri-traumatic factors include the severity of the trauma, perceived life threat, personal injury, interpersonal violence, and dissociation during the trauma that persists afterward.
Post-traumatic risk factors include negative appraisals, ineffective coping strategies, subsequent exposure to distressing reminders, subsequent adverse life events, and other trauma-related losses.
According to the study, the majority of men (61%) and women (51%) in the U.S. experience at least one potentially traumatic even in their lifetimes as immigrants. Children are not exempt from this; about 68% reported experiencing a potentially traumatic even by the age of 16.
The migration process shapes the health and adjustment of these individuals. It begins at home, many of them are fleeing from difficult experiences or poverty, only to arrive to a foreign land, where they face even scarier environments. The difficulties of not knowing the language, living in poverty, not having a permanent home or job, and the fear of being deported adds on this stress.
For information about the treatment of PTSD, visit SAMHSA’s Treatments for Mental Disorders page.