Trajectories of depression in aging veterans and former prisoners‐of‐war: The role of social support and hardiness

Abstract

Objectives: Depression is a prevalent outcome of traumatic experiences, such as combat and war captivity. This study explores the heterogeneity of changes over time and assesses the contribution of trauma exposure (combat vs. war captivity), hardiness, and social support for depression trajectories.

Long-Term Consequences of War Captivity in Military Veterans

“…In addition to a younger age, lower levels of education and lack of social support were also significant predictors of depression several decades after the war in a study that included prisoners from both World War II and the Korean War [21]. Other studies have also shown that lack of social support is one of the most significant predictors of developing PTSD and other psychological disorders [49,[77][78][79][80].…”

Positive Effects of Reliable Social Connections and Self-reward in Life on Depression Treatment and Prevention

“…In their study, Bachem and colleagues found that social support played a key role in preventing depression among veterans [7]. Similarly, in Canavan and colleagues' research, it was found that policies that encourage education, promote financial and health literacy, and strengthen families may reduce vulnerability to the mental health effects of unemployment, with social support buffering the relationship between involuntary unemployment and depressive symptoms [8].…”

Progressive worsening of posttraumatic stress symptoms in Syrian and Iraqi refugees associated with cumulative and victimization trauma: A longitudinal study.

“…Most commonly, these include variations upon the following trajectories: resilience (i.e., few to no symptoms following trauma exposure), recovery (i.e., clinically relevant symptoms decreasing over time), chronic (i.e., stable, high levels of symptoms over time), and delayedonset (i.e., subclinical symptoms worsening over time to severe; Armenta et al, 2019;Galatzer-Levy et al, 2018). Distinct symptom trajectories have been documented in relation to posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in particular (Armenta et al, 2019;, though similar patterns have also been observed in depression and anxiety symptoms (Armenta et al, 2019;Bachem et al, 2021;L. M.-E. Hinchey, Nashef, et al, 2023).…”