15 papers on moral injury
Special issue of the journal Frontiers in Psychiatry
ARQ was proud to participate in a special issue of the journal Frontiers in Psychiatry. This special issue on moral injury includes fifteen papers on the conceptualisation and treatment of moral injury, covering different populations, including refugees, police officers and military veterans.
The issue is open access and available online. ARQ contributed five papers:
- a refugee study
- a latent class analysis
- a paper on the development of an online treatment module
- a paper on deep fake victim-perpetrator confrontations
- and an editorial
What is moral injury?
Moral injury is a clinical concept yielding increased scientific and clinical attention. While originating from a military context, it is increasingly applied in other contexts, such as humanitarian aid settings, and to other populations, such as refugees. Moral injury refers to the severe and prolonged psychosocial suffering people may experience after involvement in actions that transgress deep moral beliefs and expectations. This includes transgressive actions taken by themselves, witnessing such actions by others, and failing to prevent such actions.
Possible consequences
Involvement in moral transgressions may lead to strong and persistent feelings of guilt, shame or anger, a change in perceptions of oneself, others and the world, and social withdrawal or self-undermining behaviour. Counselling or treatment may be helpful when such feelings become severe and impairing.
More information on moral injury
Do you have questions on moral injury? Please contact ARQ clinical psychologist and post-doctoral researcher Jackie June ter Heide at j.ter.heide@arq.org.