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LESSONS IN

RESILIENCE

In war zones and refugee camps, researchers
are putting resilience interventions to the test

By Emily Underwood Downloaded from

n 2015, in the name of science, more tionship skills to at-risk 11- to 18-year-olds. That’s where the hair collection came in.
than 800 teenage boys and girls Nubader falls into a booming category Panter-Brick and Dajani hired professional
in northern Jordan each allowed called psychosocial support; the interven- hairdressers, who collected the strands
100 strands of hair to be snipped from tions are as diverse as play therapy, par- while offering the teens stylish hairdos. The
the crowns of their heads. Roughly enting courses, and mindfulness training, samples were then shipped to a lab at the
half the teens were Syrian refugees, and they’ve flourished across more than a University of Western Ontario in Lon-
the other half Jordanians don, Canada. While the Cana-
living in the area. The hair, dian scientists ground up the http://science.sciencemag.org/
I molecular biologist Rana strands and measured levels
Dajani explained to the young- of the stress hormone cortisol,
sters, would act as a biological research assistants interviewed
diary. Chemicals embedded in- the teens about past traumas
side would document the teens’ and current stress.
stress levels before and after a On average, the Syrian cohort
program designed to increase reported six traumatic experi-
psychological resilience. ences, most commonly witness- on March 1, 2018
It was a unique experiment. ing bombardments and having
And it was one that suited Dajani, their homes forcibly searched
who’s based at The Hashemite or demolished. As Dajani lis-
University in Az-Zarqa, Jordan. tened to their harrowing sto-
Dajani looks askance at many ries, she wondered whether
humanitarian interventions im- Nubader’s setup, just 16 ses-
ported from elsewhere. “I’m sions of psychological coach-
always skeptical of any pro- Smoke rises from a November 2017 airstrike in Damascus carried out by the Syrian ing, had the power to deliver on
gram coming in from the out- government. Since the conflict began, millions have fled the country. the nonprofit’s ambitious goal:
side, which says they can heal boosting resilience by alleviat-
or help,” she says. Half-Syrian herself— dozen countries. Many aim to enhance the ing stress, strengthening relationships, and
Dajani’s mother is from Aleppo, her father resilience of children affected by war and “healing the scars of conflict.”
from Palestine—she was also eager to study other disasters.
the physiological effects of conflict. So when Finding ways to support these children THE STUDY OF PSYCHOLOGICAL RESILIENCE
medical anthropologist Catherine Panter- has never been more urgent. Hundreds of has its roots in the 1970s. That’s when
Brick, whom Dajani had met at Yale Univer- millions of young people live in countries Norman Garmezy, a developmental psycho-
sity in 2012, approached her about putting riven by armed conflict. Roughly 15% to logist at the University of Minnesota in Min-
the resilience-boosting program to the test, 20% may develop posttraumatic stress dis- neapolis, began studying schoolchildren PHOTO: DIAA AL DIN/ANADOLU AGENCY/GETTY IMAGES
she seized the opportunity. order (PTSD) and other mental illnesses. who thrived despite severe hardship, such
Run by the nongovernmental organization Psychosocial programs, usually staffed by as neighborhood violence or parents with
(NGO) Mercy Corps, headquartered in Port- laypeople with various levels of training, mental illness. After Garmezy retired, his
land, Oregon, and Edinburgh, the Youth Take are feasible in war zones and refugee camps students picked up where he left off, pin-
Initiative—or, in Arabic, Nubader program— in a way that specialized psychological care pointing factors that helped these children
would teach stress management and rela- often is not. The question is: Do they work? cope. Some were environmental, such as a

976 2 MARCH 2018 • VOL 359 ISSUE 6379 sciencemag.org SCIENCE
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