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Introduction: The COVID-19 pandemic brought about unprecedented problems for contemporary society. Among the numerous challenges faced following the spread of the virus, the need to provide assessment tools and remote psychological assistance certainly deserves particular attention. Indeed, this profound paradigm shift in psychological assessment and care occurred during a period of fragility for people already suffering from the restrictions imposed to stem the spread of the virus. One population particularly affected by the pandemic was students, including university students. The latter faced the pandemic in a particularly critical formative period. Methods: For these reasons, our systematic review has two main objectives: (i) identify the assessment tools and psychological dimensions most used/investigated during the pandemic in Italian university students; (ii) systematize and deepen our knowledge about the impact of the pandemic on the psychological wellbeing of Italian university students. Our search used PRISMA 2020 guidelines on Web of Science, Pubmed, Scopus, and EBSCOHost. Results: The results indicated that the psychological dimensions most investigated in university students during the pandemic were anxiety and depression. At the same time, the most used assessment instruments were the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI-Y) and the Beck Depression Inventory-II (BDI-II). Furthermore, it is clear from the results that the pandemic has harmed the psychological wellbeing of university students. Finally, we dedicated a section to discuss the interventions implemented by university counseling services during the pandemic. Discussion: This review could improve the work of university counseling services in this post-pandemic period and contribute to developing specific screening and assessment programs for future emergencies.

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BACKGROUND: Professionals working with refugees are vicariously exposed to complex traumatic experiences lived by forced migrants, which can lead to the risk of developing secondary traumatic stress, burnout, and a poor compassion satisfaction. The current study aimed to explore the effects of secondary traumatic stress on burnout and compassion satisfaction in 264 Italian professionals working with refugees and forced migrants. Moreover, it examined the mediating role of emotion regulation between secondary traumatic stress and both burnout and compassion satisfaction. METHODS: A structural equation modeling (SEM) was performed to test the hypothesis. RESULTS: The results showed that increased levels of secondary traumatic stress were associated with an increase of burnout both directly and indirectly through the mediation of emotion regulation. Emotion regulation also totally mediated the relationship between secondary traumatic stress and compassion satisfaction. CONCLUSIONS: The results suggested that prevention or interventions programs targeting emotion regulation might be important to improve the professional quality of life of operators working with refugees and forced migrants.

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This study provides a culturally sensitive quantitative investigation aimed at assessing the post-traumatic symptomatology, post-migratory difficulties, and resilience of 36 Nigerian male asylum seekers hosted in the province of Caserta, South Italy. A survey composed by the Harvard Trauma Questionnaire-Revised (HTQ-R), the Post-Migratory Checklist (PLMD), and the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC) was administered to participants. Descriptive and correlation analyses were made in order to describe the mental health risk and protective factors and understand the relation between these. A linear regression analysis was used to evaluate the influence of post-migratory difficulties and resilience on PTSD. Stratified bivariate analyses were also computed to detect PTSD group and no-PTSD group differences about post-migration difficulties and resilience levels. Regression analysis showed that PMLD numbers significantly increased the risk of having PTSD. No significant effect emerged for the level of resilience. Statistically significant differences between the PTSD group and non-PTSD group in relation to post-migratory difficulties were also found. No differences in the resilience factors emerged. The results offer a glimpse into a specific ethnic group of asylum seekers and its mental health risks and protective factors, taking into consideration the specificities of their past and current life-story experiences. Clinical implications for professionals working in the field of forced migration will be outlined.

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This study explored the experience of growth related to being a cancer patient by implementing a thematic analysis. An online questionnaire was completed by 69 patients narrating their growth experience related to cancer. Collected narratives were analyzed by running a deductive thematic analysis, starting from the five domains of the Post-Traumatic Growth Inventory (PTGI) and searching for the presence or absence of topics. Descriptive statistics and correlational analysis were performed. The five factors of the PTGI were identified in the narratives. The thematic analysis we performed defined a further theme that we labeled the "time dimension", which saturated 37.7% of the entire sample. The presences of four sub-themes related to the "time dimension" were also found: "tracing a new temporal rhythm", "the value of deserved time", "facing the caducity of life" and "a view on the future". Each sub-theme significantly correlated with the theme of the "time dimension". This emergent theme does not correlate in our results with other domains of personal growth in cancer previously described in the scientific literature, emerging as an independent variable not significantly associated with other domains of post-traumatic growth. Our results suggest further investigation in the role of the time dimension in the practical and emotional experience of growth with regard to cancer.

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Background: The mental health of university students is significantly affected when faced with public health emergencies and requires specific interventions to help support and prevent any long-lasting effects that the pandemic may have on their mental health status. This study aims to evaluate the impact of an online individual counseling intervention provided by the University of Foggia and carried out during the COVID-19 pandemic on the mental health status of a sample of university students. Methods: 32 Italian undergraduate students took part in a one-group pretest-posttest research design. The data was gathered in two times: before the start of the counseling intervention (T1), positive and negative affect, satisfaction with life, global mental distress, anxiety, stress, and future time perspective were collected, at the end of the counseling intervention (T2), the same dimensions were measured. A one-way repeated measures multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was performed, and single Bonferroni-corrected dependent t-tests were conducted on variables showing a significant change over time. Results: The results showed that positive affect, subjective well-being, and future time perspective increased significantly after the intervention. In contrast, the participants reported significantly lower levels of negative affect, global mental distress, state and trait anxiety, as well as perceived stress over time. Conclusions: The study demonstrates the promising impact of online counseling intervention and its efficient contribution in promoting the well-being of university students. The results contribute to the ongoing debate concerning the psychological impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on young adults, helping professionals develop more efficient clinical and psychological interventions.

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Due to severe traumatization, the narrative meaning-making processes of asylum seekers are often disrupted. However, the ability of asylum seekers to integrate trauma into their personal narratives has strong implications on their mental health as well as on their asylum claim. OBJECTIVE: Starting with the presentation of a new method, the Asylum Seekers Photographic Interview (ASPI), developed through participatory processes and aimed to increase meaning-making processes, the article evaluates the effects of the ASPI on asylum seekers' narrative organization. METHOD: A quasi-experimental research design was carried out. The posttraumatic symptomatology of 36 Nigerian asylum seekers hosted in Italy was assessed. Participants were then randomly divided into two groups: an intervention group assessed by the ASPI and a control group assessed by a non-image-mediated narrative interview. Quantitative data were analyzed through a descriptive analysis, and the interviews were analyzed according to various dimensions of narrative meaning-making processes. A multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was then carried out to evaluate the significance of eventual differences of narrative indexes between the groups. RESULTS: The MANOVA showed statistically significant differences of narrative indexes in the intervention group in the Word Count, Internal States, and Coherence categories, caused by the only effect of "intervention vs. control group," F(8, 25) = 5.902, p = .000, η² partial = .65). CONCLUSION: The results showed the effectiveness of the new methodology in increasing the narrative organization of experiences, contributing to the research on trauma and narratives in the context of forced migration. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

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The study presents a qualitative and culturally-sensitive investigation of the lived experiences of the forced migration of six Nigerian asylum seekers, three men and three women, hosted in Italy. Through a focus on gender identity issues, the study aimed to explore possible gender differences between participants and define their specific needs, requirements and characteristics. Overall, the gender-focused perspective through which we explored participants' subjective experiences has enriched our understanding of their unique life stories, shedding light on the psychic dimensions as well as on the social and cultural inscriptions of their gender identity and providing insights on the different ways in which Nigerian women and men made sense of their experiences of displacement, migration, violence and trauma.

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The increasing number of asylum seekers and refugees in Europe calls for even more professionals to take care of refugees' mental health. Although different studies claim that migration could be a potential risk factor for self-harming behaviours, an in-depth exploration of the presence and characteristics of self-harm in the context of asylum is needed. In accordance with PRISMA guidelines, a systematic review was conducted across the databases Scopus, PubMed, Web of Knowledge and PsycArticles, regarding the main features of self-harming behaviour among refugees in Europe. Twelve articles and 3 main trajectories were identified: (1) A context at-risk: self-harm and detention centres; (2) A target at-risk: self-harm and unaccompanied minors; (3) A comparison between the mental health of asylum seekers and natives. Research on this topic in Europe is still underdeveloped and disorganised. Studies have mainly carried out wider quantitative investigations on mental health, usually overlapping self-harm with suicide. Detention centres emerged as the most widely investigated context and the one with the highest risk for self-harming behaviours. Instead, unaccompanied minors emerged as a particularly vulnerable category. Research in this field should be improved, combining quantitative and qualitative methods for a deeper understanding of the meanings of self-harm across cultures.

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We present a qualitative study exploring the subjective meanings that five female Nigerian asylum seekers hosted in Italy attributed to their pre-migratory, migratory and post-migratory experiences, with an examination in-depth of the gender identity dimensions. We developed and administered semi-structured interviews, analyzed according to the Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis. On the background of the identity breakdown produced by forced migration, we highlight an inadequate integration process of the gender roles of woman and mother, generating a fracture that makes women's experiences particularly fragile. Reflections on the implication of the study and of the development of intervention programs will be outlined.

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INTRODUCTION: Health emergencies, such as epidemics, have detrimental and long-lasting consequences on people's mental health, which are higher during the implementation of strict lockdown measures. Despite several recent psychological researches on the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic highlighting that young adults represent a high risk category, no studies specifically focused on young adults' mental health status have been carried out yet. This study aimed to assess and monitor Italian young adults' mental health status during the first 4 weeks of lockdown through the use of a longitudinal panel design. METHODS: Participants (n = 97) provided self-reports in four time intervals (1-week intervals) in 1 month. The Syndromic Scales of Adult Self-Report 18-59 were used to assess the internalizing problems (anxiety/depression, withdrawn, and somatic complaints), externalizing problems (aggressive, rule-breaking, and intrusive behavior), and personal strengths. To determine the time-varying effects of prolonged quarantine, a growth curve modeling will be performed. RESULTS: The results showed an increase in anxiety/depression, withdrawal, somatic complaints, aggressive behavior, rule-breaking behavior, and internalizing and externalizing problems and a decrease in intrusive behavior and personal strengths from T1 to T4. CONCLUSIONS: The results contributed to the ongoing debate concerning the psychological impact of the COVID-19 emergency, helping to plan and develop efficient intervention projects able to take care of young adults' mental health in the long term.

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Introduction: Within a wider international research project aimed at operationalize the psychodynamic construct of capacity to love (Kernberg, 2011), the Capacity to Love Inventory (CTL-I) is a 41-items self-report questionnaire assessing six dimensions: interest in the life project of the other, basic trust, gratitude, common ego ideal, permanence of sexual passion, loss, and mourning. Objectives: The study is aimed at validating the Italian version of the CTL-I. Method: A total sample of 736 Italian non-clinical adults was administered a checklist assessing socio-demographic variables, and the CTL-I. A Confirmatory Factor Analyses (CFA) was conducted to examine the construct validity of the Italian version of the CTL-I. Only a part of the total sample (320 participants) was administered an additional series of concurrent measures in order to investigate the convergent validity of the CTL-I. Correlations with measures of socio-sexual orientation, quality of romance relations, and psychopathological questionnaires were examined through Pearson's correlation coefficients. Results: CFA results suggested that the Italian CTL-I fully replicated the six-factor structure of the original CTL-I. Cronbach's alpha index provided satisfactory results for all subscales and the correlations with concurrent measures were in expected direction. Conclusion: The results showed promising psychometric characteristics of the Italian version of CTL-I. Implications of the feasibility of the instrument in clinical and psychotherapeutic settings are discussed.