INDIVIDUAL CHANGE AFTER GENOCIDE IN BOSNIAN SURVIVORS OF ETHNIC CLEANSING - ASSESSING PERSONALITY DYSFUNCTION

The authors used the SCID-DES (disorders of extreme stress) instrument to assess for personality change in Bosnian survivors of ''ethnic cle ansing.'' Twenty four refugees underwent systematic, trauma-focused, r esearch assessments, including the SCID-DES interview. Overall, this g roup of Bosnian survivors had been severely traumatized as a result of the Serbian nationalists' genocide. However no subject met diagnostic criteria for DES. The SCID-DES yields far lower rates of trauma-relat ed personality change in Bosnian survivors of genocide than in adult s urvivors of prolonged early life traumas. Therefore, the DES construct may have better application to prolonged, interpersonal, early life t raumas than to the prolonged communal traumas of genocide.