Over the past 25 years, the children of the Occupied Territories in the Gaza Strip and West Bank have confronted a variety of traumatic events, including witnessing act of violence to friends, relatives, experiencing physical trauma themselves, imprisonment, and shootings. Children's health and behaviour following exposure to environments of war, armed conflict, military oppression, and occupation is characterized by a variety of symptoms. Other factors like personality, concurrent psychiatric disorders, age and gender, social, family, and cultural could be risk or protective factors.
Cultural factors can influence the children response to traumatic events.
This study sought to explain the type and frequency of traumatic event in children and the symptomatology of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, specific and nonspecific, cultural factors affecting response to trauma. They included assessment interviews and progress notes written by psychologists and psychiatrists at the centre. The sample included 46 boys and 24 girls. The mean age was 12.9 years. Area Male Female No.