Psychological and psychopathological characterization of university students who have been exposed to situations of sociopolitical violence

Abstract

The purpose of this descriptive-correlational study, carried out between July 2002 and December 2003, with students from the U.P.B. - Medellín, is to describe some psychological and psychopathological characteristics of a group of young university students of both sexes belonging to middle and upper socioeconomic strata of the city of Medellín who have been exposed, at least for one occasion, to situations of socio-political violence derived of the conflict situation that the country is going through. In the study, the presence of some psychopathological characteristics was explored and evaluated according to the classification of the D.S.M. IV - TR) and the presence of some psychological and psychosocial variables such as self-esteem, social support and coping strategies present in the studied subjects. The results obtained indicate that women have been exposed to more violent acts and present a greater number of psychopathological indicators than the male population. However, the female population shows the presence of greater psychological resources to adapt positively to both their subjective, intersubjective and objective reality, which is expressed in the highest levels of self-esteem, social support and coping strategies reported. The disorders that occurred most frequently in the study population were: mild and moderate suicide risk, hypomanic episode and generalized anxiety.