The psychopathological condition of unaccompanied foreign minors in residential childcare contexts. A research study on trauma and its clinical pathway

Introduction: The unaccompanied foreigner minors are minors who left their country of origin for necessity or constraint conditions, being in Italy without the accompaniment of parental figures or other meaningful adults. They arrived in Italy facing dangerous journeys, characterized by high risks’ situations related to physical and psychological integrity. It is very complex to manage the clinical interventions for these children’s severe psychological distress, considering their hard vulnerability, accentuated by the young age, the absence of reference adults and the exposure to multiple traumatic experiences that undermine their developmental processes (pre-migratory, migratory, and post-migratory traumas). Aim of the study: The present study aimed at detecting the psychological conditions of the unaccompanied foreign minors in childcare contexts by exploring the presence of symptoms related to PTSD , internalizing/externalizing problems and dissociative tendencies at three different times (t1: entry into the childcare context; t2: after six months; t3: after a year). The sample is made up of 38 migrants minors. The following tests were administered: the Italian version of SCL90-R (Preti, et al., 2011); the DIS-Q (Vanderlinden, et. al. 1993), PTSD Symptoms Scale; Italian version SDQ (Goodmann, 2005). Results: Preliminary findings showed that the symptoms of PTSD, as well as the psychopathological symptoms detectable through SCL-90-R, were not present in the minors who have just entered the childcare context but they emerged after 6 months, and then decreased after 12 months. These outcomes highlighted the importance of the childcare context interventions’ protective factor, not only in favoring the emergence of the symptoms framework linked to the multiple experienced trauma, but also in addressing ad hoc clinical treatments.