Social Psychiatry

Bruce Dohrenwend, Ph.D., Chief of Psychiatric Research
Mindy T.Fullilove, M.D., Research Psychiatrist II
Yuval Neria, Ph.D., Research Scientist VI

OVERVIEW
The Department of Social Psychiatry has developed and sustains a program of research on important substantive and methodological issues in psychiatric epidemiology. The focus of the substantive research is on questions about the role of adversity and stress in the onset and course of psychiatric disorders that are inversely related to socioeconomic status (SES) -- especially schizophrenia, major depression, antisocial personality, alcoholism, substance use disorders, and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The methodological issues center on how to conceptualize and measure major stressful life events as risk factors for the development of disorders that are inversely related to SES.

CURRENT RESEARCH
Dr. Neria has been collaborating with Dr. Dohrenwend on the investigation of positive outcomes as well as negative outcomes of trauma experience in a study of U.S. veterans of the war in Vietnam. Dr. Mindy Fullilove's program includes research on the effects of urban renewal on African Communities and action research with New York City community organizations to promote recovery after the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. The three investigators share a research interest in tracing social and psychiatric consequences of 9/11.

EDUCATION AND TRAINING
Dr. Dohrenwend continues on the Steering Committee of the NIMH-supported Research Training Program in Psychiatric Epidemiology which is co-sponsored by the School of Public Health and the Department of Psychiatry at Columbia University. Dr. Fullilove also continues her teaching at the School of Public Health. Dr. Neria is involved in training clinicians in evidence based treatment for PTSD in relation to the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center.

AWARDS AND HONORS

Dr. Fullilove received the Jeanne Spurlock Award from the American Psychiatric Association.

GRANTS
Bruce P. Dohrenwend
1 R01MH59309; 9/28/99-11/30/03; NIMH
Social Status and PTSD in U.S. Vietnam Veterans
Purpose: To investigate hypotheses about differences in prewar vulnerability/protective factors and exposure to war zone stressors that may lead to different rates of PTSD onset, and differences in post war experiences that may contribute to differences in PTSD persistence and recurrence in groups of Vietnam veterans defined by gender, socioeconomic background, and ethnic/racial background. The data for this study comes from the National Vietnam Veterans Readjustment Study (NVVRS) conducted by the Research Triangle Institute (RTI) with funds from the Veterans Administration (VA). (Overlap: This is one of the five case/control studies that supply narrative information for MH59627 below.)

Anonymous private foundation; 12/15/99-11/30/03
Social Status and PTSD in U.S. Vietnam Veterans: Social and Political History, Military Records, and Gender Differences
Purpose: To supplement the above NIMH grant by facilitating more intensive focus on the experiences of women (mainly nurses in Vietnam) compared to men, by examining the social and political history of the war over its 11 year period, and by more extensive use of data on the military operations of the war as context for the retrospective reports of the respondents.
(Overlap: This expands the above grant from NIMH.)

Anonymous private foundation; 7/1/00-6/30/04
Social Status and PTSD in U.S. Vietnam Veterans: Positive Outcomes and Heroism
Purpose: The purpose is to supplement the above NIMH grant by facilitating investigation of the positive experiences of the men and women veterans and the consequences of these experiences. (Overlap: This expands the above grant from NIMH.)

1 R01 MH59627; 2/5/01-1/31/06; NIMH
Measurement of Major Stressful Events over Life Courses
Purpose: To obtain reliable and valid measures of the important general and specific characteristics of major events in extreme situations (e.g., military combat and natural disasters) and major events in more usual situations (e.g., spousal bereavement, unemployment) that will make it possible to investigate their contribution to the onset and course of psychiatric disorders such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), major depression, alcoholism, substance use disorder, antisocial personality, and schizophrenia. The first phase of the project will analyze the literature on case studies of individual events in order to develop procedures for rating the important general and specific characteristics of these events. The second phase will test these procedures on event narratives from five case/control studies. (Overlap: See MH59309 above.)

Mindy Fullilove
9/30/03- 9/29/05; CDC
A Natural History of building an Anti-Violence Youth Center
This project will follow children, family and neighborhood changes as a youth center is erected in Washington Heights.

8/31/03 – 8/30/04; Robert Wood Johnson Foundation – Heath and Society Scholars Program at Columbia University.
Purpose: “Understanding the transmission of urban decay along a transportation route: a comparison of two transects.” This pilot study will collect data on the organization of urban decay along two major avenues leading from the city of Newark, NJ.

Yuval Neria
The Sep 11 Fund; 4/3/2003-4/3/2004
Purpose: Posttraumatic Stress Disorder and Prolonged Exposure Therapy: Training Clinicians in Post-9/11 Greater New York.

The New York Times Foundation; 2003-2004
The NYC Consortium for Effective Trauma Treatment: Addressing the mental health needs of adults, children, and families after the WTC Disaster. .

NARSAD; Young Investigator Award; 2003-2005
Major Depression and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder Following Exposure to the World Trade Center Attack.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Dohrenwend BP, Neria Y, et al. “Positive tertiary appraisals and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder in U.S. male veterans of the war in Vietnam: The roles of positive affirmation, positive reformulation, and defensive denial.” Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 72: 417-433, 2004

Fullilove MT, Hernandez-Cordero L, et al. “Promoting collective recovery through organizational mobilization: The post-9/11 disaster relief work of NYC RECOVERS.” Journal of Biosocial Studies, in press.

Fullilove MT, Neighborhoods and risk. Chapter in: Neighborhoods and Health, ed. by I. Kawachi and L. Berkman, Oxford University Press, NY, 2003.

Fullilove MT, What did Ian tell God? School violence in East New York. Chapter in: Deadly Lessons: Understanding Lethal School Violence, NAS Press, 2003; pgs. 198-246.

Neria., Y, Koenen, K. Self-Reported Physical Health in Israeli War Veterans with Combat Stress Reaction: An Eighteen-Year Follow-up Study. Anxiety, Stress, and Coping. 16: 227-239, 2003.