Secondary adversities can arise.
However, the majority of our population was protected from secondary adversities as they were able to return to unaffected home communities.
The participants in the present study were protected against many common secondary adversities in the aftermath of disasters, such as the destruction of homes and disruption of jobs.
The participants experienced a single, easily identifiable trauma and were largely protected against reminders and secondary adversities due to their return to intact homes and rather unaffected communities.
However, even such an extended dose-effect perspective that includes secondary adversities as moderators neglects potential protective factors that have been emphasized in a risk-and-resilience perspective [ 24– 26].
Impairments in family and community functioning may, in turn, impair child adaptation and development [ 15] through secondary adversities such as parental loss, poverty, homelessness, community, and family violence [ 16].
The finding of increased rates of family violence towards children in post-war populations corroborates the notion that mass trauma typically leads to secondary adversities on various levels, for instance family disruption and loss, homelessness or impaired access to education and health services [ 15, 16].
Conversely, continued symptoms of PTSD and depression seemed to contribute to secondary stresses and adversities, such as disturbances in school and social functioning, which in turn imposed more difficulties for them to cope with the symptoms.
The present study examined whether young adults reporting childhood adversity would show enhanced central (secondary hyperalgesia) and peripheral sensitization (spontaneous pain) following stress, a single session of written emotional disclosure (WED) of trauma.
Two-way ANCOVAs controlling for experimenter revealed main effects of adversity on capsaicin-induced area of secondary hyperalgesia, F 1,32) = 6.299, p = .017, and spontaneous pain intensity, F 1,32) = 5.332, p = .028, and unpleasantness, F 1,32) = 4.906, p = .034, with the high adversity group reporting greater spontaneous pain during WED.
However, positive effects were found on the perceived work attitude secondary outcome measure, the persistence in the face of adversity self-efficacy subscale and the skill discretion subscale of the psychosocial work characteristics.
