Free Essay Sample - Holocaust Children: a Review

Wars in the twentieth century left a lot of tragedy and damage in their wake. Losses have been experienced both physically and psychologically. Studies have found that the effects of Holocaust trauma have been passed on to children in the course of development of peoples since the adversities that they faced in Europe in the 20th century (Heart). This paper is a research analysis into the overall effect of environmental factors in the development of a people, with reference to the trauma theory.

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Children of respondents in the study were more likely to experience stress disorders among other negative forms of thinking based on the influence of parents who had spent time in concentration camps during the Holocaust (Thomson). Similar results were also obtained for children whose parents had to hide during this time (Thomson). Furthermore, the effect has been felt in other areas, including substance abuse (Heart). Multiple studies have found the effect to be widespread. The effect has also been seen in areas away from the original affected areas in Europe, where these effects have been seen in the children of New Zealand Jews against hostile non-Jew communities (Rowland-Klein and Dunlop).

As such, the relationship between trauma and nostalgia can be proven through their experiences. The ineffaceable shadows of holocaust children haunt the parents wherever they go and such effects are passed on to their children through environmental factors (Kellermann). Beyond the flesh and blood of the peoples, the genetics of the parents who may have been partially or wholly defrayed during this time pass down to their children and have adverse effects. It thus becomes an issue of surviving psychic trauma for both the parents and the children through a process of splintered refection into the issues that affected them in the past (Suleiman). The issue becomes one of concern because of the different reactions to the atrocities that happened to parents during the Holocaust.

Some of the more evident issues that the people from the Jewish background have had to face are the continued effect of the Holocaust into todays society. The trauma theory is about the passing of traumatic experiences that a person or a community of persons has gone through to the generations that follow after them (Baum). The effect of such experiences is carried over into other generations where adverse effects from the same can be seen. The trauma theory seeks to explain why negative characteristics are transferred from one generation to another, and points to the environmental effects on the growth and development of a person.

Works Cited

Heart, MHYB. "The Historical Trauma Response Among Natives and Its Relationship with Substance Abuse: A Lakota Illustration." Journal of Psychoactive Drugs (2003): 7-13.

Kellermann, N. "Transmission of Holocaust trauma-An integrative view." Psychiatry (2001).

Rowland-Klein, Dani and Rosemary Dunlop. "The Transmission of Trauma across Generations: Identification with Parental Trauma in Children of Holocaust Survivors." Australian & New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry (2008): 358-69.

Suleiman, S. "The 1.5 generation: Thinking about child survivors and the Holocaust." American Imago (2002).

Thomson, Helen. Study of Holocaust survivors finds trauma passed on to children's genes. 2015. 24 November 2015 <http://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/aug/21/study-of-holocaust-survivors-finds-trauma-passed-on-to-childrens-genes>.