Straub also believes that one avenue of healing is having the world acknowledge pain and suffering. In most conflicts this is rare or happens many years later. This is a place where international involvement can be particularly helpful by bearing witness to and acknowledging the pain from outside. In situations such as war and genocide, people have gone through the trauma as a group even though they have different experiences of what happened to them personally. Straub believes that in this type of situation, group and community work is necessary in addition to individual healing.
Groups offer the opportunity to share their experiences and offer support.
More research is needed into what types of groups are particularly effective in various cultural situations. For example, some cultures may need certain kinds of rituals or ceremonies for people to heal and certain activities may help or hinder others. There does appear to be a growing consensus, however, that group and community work, rather than just individual therapy, is what is needed. At this point, the Friends Peace Team Project has decided to go ahead with the idea of helping the Burundi Yearly Meeting to establish a Trauma Healing and Reconciliation Center and we see the connection between trauma healing work and peace team work as very important. With the continuing violence, it is clear that the conflicts there are not over and the need is great.