What can psychoanalysis contribute to the current refugee crisis?

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1. Translation: Nora Hettich and Constanze Rickmeyer; editing: Justin Morris.

Notes

1. Translation: Nora Hettich and Constanze Rickmeyer; editing: Justin Morris.

2. See www.sigmund-freud-institut.de.

3. The IDeA Centre is an interdisciplinary research centre that studies ‘children‐at‐risk’ from different perspectives. In the meantime, more than 100 researchers from many different disciplines (educational sciences, neurosciences, psychoanalysis, developmental psychology etc.) are cooperating. The centre is supported by the Excellence Initiative of the State of Hessen (see Leuzinger‐Bohleber, 2014, 2015).

4. The ‘first reception camp’ Michaelis‐Dorf was established by the Red Cross Darmstadt during the acute ‘refugee crisis’ in August/September 2015, first as a camp of tents and then in the facilities of former US military barracks. Accommodation in the former barracks has been supported by a big thermo tent and new, smaller houses have been erected. Depending on the number of refugees arriving, 400 to 800 people have been housed in the village during the last months (maximum capacity: 1000 people).

5. The project FIRST STEPS is a project for immigrant families, implemented by the SFI in cooperation with the AFI. The pilot study started in 2007. The primary study was implemented in Frankfurt, in 2010, and since 2012 additionally in Berlin. The project focuses on the earliest integration of children with an immigrant background, supporting their parents in the critical phase of migration and early parenthood. By using a prospective randomized comparison group design, the effectiveness of a psychoanalytically oriented early prevention program (intervention A) is compared to the outcomes of groups provided for by paraprofessionals (intervention B). Intervention A is a professional provision supporting the immigrant families based on developmental knowledge of early parenting, and combines home and centre‐based intervention. Intervention B is a centre‐based provision given by paraprofessionals with an immigrant background. More than 1000 families have been contacted in Frankfurt and Berlin. Here, 330 families decided to participate in the project and have been randomly assigned to intervention A or B. Around 140 have continuously taken part in the study in Frankfurt where recruitment has already been completed. In Berlin recruitment is still ongoing. The families are supported and assessed during the first three years of the children's lives until entering kindergarten. Social and family stresses, the quality of the parent‐child interaction, child attachment security, the affective, cognitive and social development of the children, the children's physiological stress level during kindergarten entrance as well as the social integration of the families are assessed.

The first preliminary results show that professionally supported, good early parenting (Intervention A) improved the social‐emotional, cognitive and language development of immigrant children as well as the social integration of their families. Due to the successful implementation of the project in Frankfurt, a further roll‐out across Germany has started, and in addition to the implementation in Berlin another implementation of FIRST STEPS in Stuttgart is currently being realized (see Burkhardt‐Mußmann, 2015; Emde & Leuzinger‐Bohleber, 2014; Fritzemeyer (submitted); Lebiger‐Vogel et al., 2014, 2015, Leuzinger‐Bohleber et al., 2010, 2012, Leuzinger‐Bohleber & Lebiger‐Vogel, 2016, Rickmeyer et al., 2015).

6. According to German law only unprotected children and adolescents under 18 years can bring their families to Germany.