Experience of psychic restructuring among refugees in the context of life in refuge

Abstract

Changes in the inner voice, thoughts, and feelings due to the recurrent experiences in social and cultural reality are defined as psychic restructuring (PR). Any collective trauma can drastically change a person’s psyche in multiple ways. The first argument of the study is that PR happens in individuals as a result of exile, which has manifold reasons. The second argument is that first-generation older adults crave for their homeland more intensely because of their subtle memories of the left behind. The third argument is that there are metaphorical representations of exilic experiences in the art forms that would depict their inexplicable quest for PR. Finally, it suggests the possibility of constructive PR in refugees with the aid of clinically driven and standardized art-based therapies (ABT). These arguments have multicollinearity in the context of PR, which still needs to be studied. The study tries to bridge the gap or lacuna in this research arena.

Keywords:

• Art-based therapy
• exile
• psychic restructuring
• life in the refuge
• first-generation

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).