The journey of acculturation 鈥斕齛dapting to a new culture as an immigrant 鈥斕齝an be an overwhelming and highly stress-inducing听experience, even more so for individuals who have been displaced due to the horrors of war or political persecution. Now, envision the added challenge of caring for a neurodivergent child within this scenario 鈥斕maneuvering through unfamiliar health and social services in a new land, all while tending to that child's own trauma, which may be masked by their unique condition.听
草莓污视频导航 student Abdullah Bernier's graduate research in school and applied child psychology at the Werklund School of Education examined this scenario, delving into the lived experience of Syrian refugees who arrived in Canada with autistic children or adolescents in their care.听
Interviewing several such families for 鈥,鈥 Bernier鈥檚 qualitative data reveals the myriad challenges facing caregivers, both pre and post migration. These include facing stigma over their children鈥檚 diagnoses to the outright destruction of schools due to the conflict back in Syria to navigating day-to-day resettlement difficulties in a new country while trying to access services for autistic individuals.听
Bernier says his intention was to fill a scholarship gap on the use of supports by this population and to offer concrete recommendations to settlement agencies and service providers. He presented the study to a representative of the Calgary Catholic Immigration Society, and he says it was well received.听
"What I really wanted to do is to understand where the difficulties and the complexities are [in accessing autism-related services] and then provide that information to organizations for policy development,鈥 says Bernier. 鈥淭he systems are hard enough for somebody who is born and raised here, never mind having to navigate that with a language barrier.鈥听
Since completing his 尘补蝉迟别谤鈥檚, Bernier, who is the recipient of multiple awards, including the听2023听Izaak Walton Killam Doctoral Scholarship and the 2021-2023听Eyes High听Doctoral Recruitment Scholarship, is continuing his autism-focused research as a PhD student, also in school and applied child psychology at听Werklund.听
鈥淚 developed a passion for working with that specific population as an undergraduate in psychology. I did a lot of in-home intervention support,鈥 he says. 鈥淚 was mentored by speech pathologists, occupational therapists and psychologists.听
鈥When I was looking at graduate programs, I specifically wanted to work with children and adolescents because I really loved working with kids. Also, one of the faculty at the 草莓污视频导航 under Werklund听is my supervisor, Dr. Adam McCrimmon, who is one of the leading experts in autism in Canada.
鈥I felt fortunate that I was able to apply and be his supervisee and to learn more about it from the research side, but also how that informs the clinical side as well.鈥听
One of the key points emphasized by participants in his 尘补蝉迟别谤鈥檚 research was that professionals need to consider refugee children鈥檚 experience of crisis and war, and how the traumatic effects of this presents in autism-related behaviours. This served as a launchpad of sorts in terms of Bernier鈥檚 current doctoral research on the intersection of trauma and autism, though not relegated to a specific sub-population as in his earlier study.
Autistic individuals, he says, tend to have a high co-occurrence rate with mental conditions, yet those related to trauma 鈥斕齈TSD, for example 鈥斕齢ave苍鈥檛 been fully investigated.听
鈥淏ecause of that intersection between autism and trauma, a lot of the time they can show similar symptom expressions, or they might not be able to relay their experiences. There is a lot of diagnostic overshadowing which I feel is important to do more research into,鈥 says Bernier.
鈥淚f an autistic individual has experienced trauma and meets the criteria for trauma-related disorder, and that鈥檚 not recognized in assessment or intervention modalities, it may impact their outcomes and potentially do harm for that individual as that part of their experience isn't recognized and supported.鈥听
