Children After War: A Novel Approach to Promoting Resilience Through Music

Increasing research is promoting the need for innovative, holistic, and sustainable ways to foster resiliency and recovery in war-affected children. The Shropshire Music Foundation seeks to promote a culture of peace and unity, as well as development and recovery for children living in postconflict Kosovo. The current study evaluated the effectiveness of this program, by independent investigators, in promoting resiliency and diminishing distress in program participants. The study evaluated groups of students with no program participation, new program participants, 12 months of participation, and program graduates (N 74). Overall, children who participated in the program at least 1 year evidenced fewer affective and cognitive disturbances than children recently enrolled. Furthermore, the relationship between posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptomology and conduct problems was mediated by attention problems. As researchers and practitioners from various fields continue to address the damage caused by armed conflicts, there is a need for developing innovative and dynamic approaches to healing and recovery in affected communities. This article will examine one such innovative approach to fostering recovery in children affected by conflict in Kosovo. After providing a brief background on the armed conflict in this region, we will examine some of the liter- ature on the psychological consequences of war and trauma on individuals and communities, specifically on children. Rationale for the need of a holistic approach to recovery will then precede the purpose of the current study, which is to examine the effects of a community-based music education program on cognitive and behavioral functioning in Kosovo youth. The region today known as Kosovo has a long history of ethnic and social tensions, outside rule, and war. Centrally located in the Balkans and bordered by Albania, Montenegro, Serbia, and Mace- donia, the ethnically Albanian-dominated region of Kosovo had been under Serbian rule since the Middle Ages. In 1991, Kosovo Albanians (Kosovar) declared full independence of Serbian rule and launched an insurgence to assert their claim. The Serbian military began a violent campaign in 1998 to control uprisings, resulting in massacre and the ejection of approximately 800,000 Kosovar from the country. International peacekeepers forced a cease-fire and expulsion of Serbian military forces in 1999. Though NATO and the United Nations became involved at this point, Kosovo independence was not officially recognized until 2008. During the intervening period, the United Nations Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) oversaw the gover- nance of the Republic of Kosovo (for a more extensive historical overview, see Kubo, 2010 or the online Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) World Factbook page for Kosovo). Today, the country is still establishing itself as an independent republic and seeking to heal the wounds of war and hatred. Though many Kosovo Albanians outmigrated as refugees, many others are cur- rently fighting a different type of battle: rebuilding ethnic relation- ships, reintegrating uprooted people, and establishing unified so- cietal structures.