Department of Psychology, Faculty of Philosophy

Copenhagen Burnout Inventory (CBI) is a tool assessing fatigue and exhaustion as the core features of burnout. Despite its wide use and evidence of good psychometric properties, little is known about its structural validity. Therefore, this study aimed to examine internal psychometric properties and the latent composition of the Serbian version of CBI. A sample of 382 child welfare workers engaged in the work with the domestic population and professionals working with refugees and migrants completed a 19-item version of CBIser. Results showed that full-scale CBI despite having good psychometric properties lacks structural validity. A short-form of the instrument was empirically derived and several concurrent confirmatory models found in previous studies were tested. A three-factor model of personal, work-, and client-related burnout showed to be the best fitting one, and the 13-item form of CBI proved to be a structurally valid and psychometrically sound measure of burnout.

Most interventions for mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS) have been developed in contexts and with populations that differ significantly from the realities of migration. There is an urgent need for MHPSS in transit; however, transit-specific aspects of MHPSS provision are often neglected due to the inherent challenges transit poses to traditional conceptualizations of practice. The Delphi method, which consisted of three iterative rounds of surveys, was applied with the goal of identifying challenges to and adaptations of MHPSS in the transit context. Twenty-six MHPSS providers working with refugees in 10 European transit countries participated; 69% of participants completed all three survey rounds. There was consensus that a flexible model of MHPSS, which can balance low intensity interventions and specialized care, is needed. Agreement was high for practice-related and sociopolitical factors impacting MHPSS in transit; however, the mandate of MHPSS providers working in...

In the past few years the number of refugees, migrants and asylum seekers worldwide has increased dramatically. Serbia, as a mainly transit country currently hosts over 6,000 new asylum-seekers and refugees, over 26.200 refugees and 198.500 internally displaced persons from the ex-Yugoslavia region, and 1.950 persons at risk of statelessness. Migrants are often under acute and chronic stress. Many of them were traumatized in their homelands and during their journey, due to persecution, violence, and human right violations, and they are confronted with ongoing stressors in the exile countries. Extensive research has shown increased rates and substantial variability in the prevalence of short-term and long-term mental health problems among refugees, asylum seekers and migrants. The most prevalent psychiatric disorders are depression, anxiety, prolonged grief, somatoform disorders, psychosis, substance use disorders, and disorders specifically related to stress, particularly posttrauma...

This study investigates group differences in Militant Extremist Mindset (MEM) measures of Pro-violence, Divine Power, Utopianism, Vile World, and West, together with several variables building its nomological network. The study was based on groups from domicile population living within and outside the conflict zone and a sample of refugees/asylum seekers. We hypothesize that refugees as a group do not present a higher risk for engagement in militant extremism and, consequently, terrorism. Therefore, they do not present security risks for the host countries. Findings show that groups living in a conflict zone tend to endorse all aspects of militant extremism and conservative ideology. Furthermore, our results do not support the widely held belief that refugees are a security threat, as they tend to reject violent extremism as a means to achieve goals.

The present study aims to identify contextual and psychological factors of proneness to radicalization and violent extremism (RVE) operationalized through the Militant Extremist Mindset scale (MEM) consisting of three distinct aspects: Proviolence (PV), Vile World beliefs (VW), and trust in Divine Power (DP). A community sample of 271 high school students (72% females) from Belgrade and Sandžak regions in Serbia completed: (1) a 24-item MEM scale; (2) contextual measures including a 6-item scale of family dysfunction (FDys) and a 4-item composite measure capturing exposure to a harsh school environment and peer abuse (HSE); (3) psychological measures including the 9-item Right-Wing Authoritarianism scale (RWA), the 5-item Social Dominance Orientation scale (SDO), and the 20-item UCLA Loneliness scale (LON). A path analysis was conducted with contextual factors on the first and psychological factors on the second level of the model predicting the three factors of MEM. LON was positiv...

Exposure to the traumatic experiences of others can lead to secondary traumatization (STS), a condition comprising trauma-related symptoms. There is a lack of evidence on efficient ways to mitigate STS among professionals working with refugees, who are secondarily exposed to traumatic content. This study examines the latent structure of coping mechanisms and explores the predictive power of coping strategies for STS in a sample of professionals working with refugees. A total of 288 participants (age: M = 34.01, SD = 10.03; 57.3% female) working with refugees completed the COPE Inventory and Secondary Traumatic Stress Scale. Factor analysis of the COPE Inventory showed that coping mechanisms are grouped around four interrelated factors—Problem-focused, Socially supported emotion-focused, Avoidant, and Passive coping—which accounted for 46.7% of the variance. The regression model showed that Avoidant coping positively predicts negative alterations in cognition, mood, and reactivity (N...