Inter-Generational Transmission of Trauma in Croatia: Veterans' Families 20 Years After the Siege of Vukovar (Research Brief)

The study was initiated in response to speculation about how much hatred and trauma from the Balkan wars of the 1990s is being passed on to the next post-war generation of children, potentially planting the seeds for another conflict. The methodology was drawn from research with children of Holocaust survivors, which hypothesizes that parents transmit their trauma to their children directly (i.e., children identify with and internalize parents' traumatic symptoms) and indirectly (i.e., children react to and try to cope with parents' traumatic symptoms). Interviews with teachers, school psychologists and veterans' families indicated that many children of Croatian veterans have high rates of emotional and behavioral difficulties, which are exacerbated by inadequate financing for mental health care, the social stigma of seeking such care, and a politicized environment which discourages inter-ethnic dialogue about the war. The researcher recruited and trained two research assistants in Vukovar, who are currnetly conducting empirical and qualitative data collection.

Alexander Ante Lupis, of Long Island University-Brooklyn, was a 2011-12 Individual Advanced Research Opportunities (IARO) fellow.