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Diana Pokhilko
Candidate of Psychological Sciences. National university of civil defence of Ukraine
ORCID 0000-0003-3374-8771
Yuliia Kostiuchenko
Practical psychologist. Preschool education institution (kindergarten) №176 combined type, Kyiv
Iuliia Goriun
Coordinator of children's direction. Prostir Yednannay, Yaremch
Anna Kybkalo
Psychotherapist
DOI - https://doi.org/10.52363/dcpp-2022.3.8
Key words: children, traumatic experience, acute stress reaction
Today, more and more often you can hear the phrase: "every Ukrainian child is mentally traumatized." Even more, every child which directly , or indirectly faced with the war - traumatized. There are many questions and contradictions about this: are children unaware of the events that are happening to them? Is there a personal trauma without participating in traumatic events? What is the difference between the reactions of children, who are experienced different traumatic events etc.
Our article is devoted to the issue of differences between stress reactions of the child's psyche, with different levels of traumatic experiences, to the negative factors of war. There are results that such reactions are found in children who were more under fire, who were in safe regions of Ukraine and were not during the shelling, and know about the consequences of the war only from the news.
The study was conducted on the basis of the Center for Psychological Support and Assistance "Space of Unity" established on the temporary residence from March to May 2022.
The article presents the features of acute stress reactions of the child's personality in the following categories:
- children who had direct personal traumatic experience of war (came under fire, received bodily injuries, witnessed death or injury, etc.)
- сhildren who were in a situation of real threat to life for a long time. Children who lived on the territory of active hostilities;
- children who left the war zone before the war, or for the first 1-2 days (children who are not in a situation of real threat to life from the war, but are internally displaced persons);
сhildren from the regions of Ukraine who did not come under fire (do not have personal experience of a real threat of war and are not internally displaced).