POSTDISASTER PSYCHOSOCIAL INTERVENTION - A FIELD-STUDY OF THE IMPACT OF DEBRIEFING ON PSYCHOLOGICAL DISTRESS

Objective: Following a catastrophic natural disaster, the authors eval uated whether brief psychological intervention (debriefing 6 months la ter) reduced disaster-related psychological distress as measured by th e Impact of Event Scale. Method: Two groups of subjects who had been e xposed to Hurricane Iniki in Hawaii were assessed before and after par ticipating in a multihour debriefing group. The intervention aimed to provide ventilation of feelings, normalization of responses, and educa tion about normal psychological reactions to the disaster in a context of group support. To provide a partial control for the passage of tim e, the pretreatment assessment of the second group was concurrent with the posttreatment assessment of the first group. Results: A repeated measures analysis of variance indicated that Impact of Event Scale sco res were reduced in both groups after the treatment. Conclusions: Ther e is preliminary empirical support for the effectiveness of postdisast er psychological intervention and for the feasibility of treatment res earch in postdisaster environments.