Peter B. Defares – författare

Originally published in 1985, this volume of Stress and Anxiety was number nine in the series first started in 1975. During this time stress research had continued to proliferate, and demands for practical solutions for stress-related problems had accelerated at an even faster pace. While much had been learned about the nature of stress and its impact on behavior, it was felt that dedicated multidisciplinary efforts by social, behavioral, and medical scientists would still be required to make further progress in this highly complex field.Growing evidence of the effects of stress on such medical disorders as coronary heart disease had stimulated demands for stress reduction and stress management programs. There remained, however, a tremendous gap between the wide variety of programs designed to ameliorate the effects of stress and the knowledge base on which such programs must depend. In the US, stress had become a major growth industry, and there was an urgent need for stress modification efforts to be firmly based on a solid foundation of empirical research.This volume is based on papers presented at two international conferences on Stress and Anxiety convened in 1980 at The Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities and Social Sciences (NIAS), Wassenaar, The Netherlands. Today it can be read in its historical context.

This book provides a state-of-the-art guide to the rapidly growing field of traumatic stress. It reviews and integrates the many scientific findings from psychology, psychiatry and sociology into an encompassing model. This general model is applicable to the reactions to war stress, disaster, violence, accidents and bereavement. Topics such as normal and disturbed coping patterns, social support and various risk factors are also discussed. In addition to the theoretical model, a number of treatment methods for posttraumatic stress disorders is described. Theoretical and practical issues of these treatments are presented.The efficiency of the methods is elucidated by the description of a psychotherapy outcome study on these methods. Information of prevention programs for victims of serious life events is also provided.This integrative approach is of interest to researchers, clinicians, public health workers, physicians, personnel workers, and all other professionals who are involved in research and/or health care with regard to traumatic events.