The breadth of survivors’ emotional reactions to disasters, crises, and traumas can be extreme, ranging from laughter to anger, or withdrawal to acting out. Crisis workers must try to understand the disaster, crisis, or trauma from the survivor’s point of view while appearing nonjudgmental and providing support. Of equal importance, crisis workers must understand that support might entail meeting survivors’ basic needs, such as hunger, rather than emotional needs. For instance, helping a survivor of a hurricane to load personal belongings into a truck, finding the survivor a meal, or providing the survivor with shelter for the night might be more helpful than facilitating his or her emotional response to the event. Much of crisis and disaster intervention is attending to very basic physical needs before anything else.
For this Assignment, you will review three case studies, select one to which you will respond, and explain how you might apply a crisis intervention model and crisis intervention skills and strategies to the survivors in the case study you chose.
To prepare for this Assignment:
Focus on the Hybrid model of crisis intervention. Think about how this model might be used to support survivors of disasters, crises, and traumas.
Think about how listening, communicating, and acting skills, as well as basic intervention strategies, are applied to disaster, crisis, and trauma survivors. Consider how each skill set and strategy support survivors.
Review the Week 4: Case Studies and select one to which you will respond.
Using the Hybrid model of crisis intervention in Chapter 3 of the course text, Crisis Intervention Strategies, think about the steps you might take to respond to survivors in the case study you selected.
Also, identify specific actions you might engage in during each step. Select at least two crisis intervention skills and at least one crisis intervention strategy you might use to respond to survivors in the case study you selected.
Think about why the crisis intervention skills and strategies you chose might be effective for responding to survivors in the case study.
The Assignment: (1–2 pages)
Identify the case study you selected.
Using the Hybrid model of crisis intervention in the course text, Crisis Intervention Strategies, explain how you might respond to survivors in the case study you selected. Be specific.
Describe at least two crisis intervention skills and at least one intervention strategy you might use with survivors in the case study, and explain why each might be effective.