Longitudinal effects of trauma

Abstract

Post-traumatic stress syndrome is now well known fact after some kind of traumatic events. It used to be thought that the effect of traumatic incidences are transient and will go away over the time. However, recent studies done both adults and children showed that traumatic effect may continue for a long time over a decades or even lifetime and even it can transferred from one generation to the next generations. This literature review provides some of the early studies and then moves on to exemplify some of the longitudinal studies done in different part of the world involving different types of natural disasters and man-made calamities. Now, we have accumulated a considerable amount of scientific literature proves that trauma can have a long lasting effects and can be very persistent situations in a person’s life.