Die Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften verleiht Rojan Amini-Nejad den Dissertationspreis für Migrationsforschung 2023 für ihr Dissertationsprojekt Targeting the mental health of asylum seekers in Austria.
By mid-2023, 110 million people were forcibly displaced worldwide as a result of war, violence, human rights violations, and natural and man-made disasters. 42,5 million of whom sought refuge outside of their home country. In Austria alone, 348.969 people applied for asylum since the refugee crisis in 2015. Pre-migration and in-transit, asylum seekers and refugees are confronted with enormous physical and psychological stressors. Even after arrival in the destination country, psychological stress is high: Refugees repeatedly report post-migration living difficulties, such as long application period, pending working permit resulting in inevitable inaction, ethnic discrimination, and loss of status. Despite the comparably elevated rates of mental disorders amongst refugees, the diagnosis and treatment of psychological effects of flight have proven to be difficult. Barriers to accessing formal treatment are compounded by a lack of intercultural therapy services, language barriers, or simply a lack of knowledge about these services. In addition to these structural barriers, low utilization is often due to refugee-specific factors influencing the perception of mental disorders (i.e., beliefs regarding the development and a lack of understanding of the symptomatology), the thematization of which is accompanied by cultural stigma. In light of this, this doctoral project aims to (1) investigate the mental health literacy and unmet needs of asylum seekers and refugees in Austria, (2) assess the impact of post-migration stressors on psychological and biological indicators of well-being, and (3) further develop and evaluate a tailored, low-threshold mental health intervention.
The development and evaluation of a transdiagnostic, low-threshold, and culture-sensitive psychoeducative program meets the urgent need for psychological care among asylum seekers and refugees. Providing early, individually tailored, low-threshold mental health care options apart from time-intensive therapy to asylum seekers may be not only beneficial to the individual but may also improve the chances of successful integration, reduce the total costs in general health care, and benefit the social and economic capital of the host nation.
Rojan Amini-Nejad hat 2021 das Masterstudium Psychologie an der Universität Wien abgeschlossen. Im Juli 2022 nahm sie das Doktoratsstudium im Fach Psychologie als DOC-Stipendiatin der ÖAW an der Universität Wien auf. Seit dieser Zeit arbeitet sie als wissenschaftliche Projektmitarbeiterin und zertifizierte Stressmanagementtrainerin an der Forschungs-, Lehr- und Praxisambulanz und dem Institut für Klinische und Gesundheitspsychologie der Fakultät für Psychologie der Universität Wien. Ihr Dissertationsprojekt ist an der Schnittstelle von interkultureller klinischer Psychologie und biologischer Psychologie zu verordnen. Zudem ist sie derzeit an einem multidisziplinären Forschungsprojekt mit RED NOSES International als Jungforscherin beteiligt.