Female survivors of abduction in armed conflict zone

: psychosocial needs, rehabilitation, and reintegration pathway

Abstract

Armed conflicts and regional wars occur across the world and girls and women are often abducted, forced to live in captivity by their captors, and exposed to various adverse conditions. Upon return, one would have hoped that their rehabilitation is approached through personalised care. Yet, it has been found that these individuals are neither documented as returned women nor included in the planning and implementation of their rehabilitation and reintegration programmes. Focusing on the perspective of adult female survivors of abduction in northeast Nigeria, this research aims to gain an understanding of the survivors’ psychosocial needs and the best way to facilitate their recovery and reintegration into their communities after abduction in armed conflict zones from their perspective. 

This research contains four studies. Semi-structed interviews of ten female survivors from northeast Nigeria were conducted using an Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) for study one. Five themes emerged: Seeking Safety from Chaos; Achieving Freedom; Physical and Psychological Loss; Support, Guardianship, and inclusion in rehabilitation planning and Physical and Mental Health. Using semi-structured interviews, seven participants from designated and host community camps were interviewed to establish how the participants’ rehabilitation is determined by where they live. Thematic analysis was utilised, and three themes were identified namely: Similarities between camps; Differences; and Shared sameness. Content analysis was utilised for study three which focuses on the human rights violation of women who returned and how these violations can be addressed. Study four is the formulation of rehabilitation pathway for women who survived abduction from armed conflict zones which is my original contribution to knowledge. 

Utilising multi-qualitative analysis methods, results from Studies One and Two show that some survivors have experienced varying degrees of psychological problems, but it appears that mental health assessment and treatments have been omitted from the survivors’ rehabilitation programmes. Consequently, it can be assumed that survivors have focused less on processing of trauma. The delivery of support by government agencies, national and international non-governmental organisations (NGOs), where most of the support comes from appears erratic, unplanned and without the survivors’ voices being incorporated into their rehabilitation. These results also indicate that the survivors’ human rights have been violated and no one appears to be talking about helping them to address the issue. 

Date of Award	4 Nov 2024
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	Abertay University
Supervisor	Penny Woolnough (Supervisor), Laura Wakeford (Supervisor), Corinne Jola (Supervisor) & Kate Smith (Supervisor)