Traumatic Poverty

Poverty is a pervasive and persistent problem around the world. Trauma is often a triggering event that leads to poverty. The combination of poverty and trauma is cyclic, where a devastating event leads to poverty, and poverty is traumatic. Both short-term stressors such as a flood or fire, and a long-term trauma such as living in a war zone cause emotional reactions, both conscious and unconscious, which can cause long-term psychological stress, making it difficult to move beyond the scope of the event and move out of poverty. There has not been a significant study into these interrelated problems until recently. Beginning in 2003, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services provided research funding for the development of poverty research centers to study the ...