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Immigrant Youth Life Stressors

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Psychotherapy for Immigrant Youth

Abstract

Although the relationship between stressors and psychopathology has been firmly established in adolescence, the heterogeneous context and characteristics of immigration, settlement, and reception confer specific stressors for immigrant youth above and beyond developmentally normal stressors faced by most youth. A conceptual model for understanding the relationship between stressful experiences and psychopathology in immigrant youth is crucial in order to implement effective treatment within this vulnerable population. This chapter defines immigrant youth life stressors as frequent environmental events or conditions that pose a risk to physical and psychological health and may compound the risk associated with previous trauma exposure. Based on a review of the literature, a categorization of immigrant youth life stressors is proposed. This chapter reviews and organizes research on immigrant youth and, based on the findings, advocates for a broader and more collaborative approach to treatment. A case example highlights how categorizing stressors holds clinical utility in guiding clinical case formulation and prioritizing intervention.

An erratum to this chapter can be found at http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-24693-2_10

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  1. Pacific Graduate School of Psychology, Palo Alto University, Palo Alto, CA, USA

    Anna Staudenmeyer, Erynn Macciomei, Margareth Del Cid & Sita G. Patel

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  1. Anna Staudenmeyer
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Correspondence to Anna Staudenmeyer .

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  1. Palo Alto University, Palo Alto, California, USA

    Sita Patel

  2. Stanford University School of Medicine, Palo Alto, California, USA

    Daryn Reicherter

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Staudenmeyer, A., Macciomei, E., Del Cid, M., Patel, S.G. (2016). Immigrant Youth Life Stressors. In: Patel, S., Reicherter, D. (eds) Psychotherapy for Immigrant Youth. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-24693-2_1

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