The psychological consequences of trauma on 28 Swedish
children were examined 1 year and
3 years after a bus accident in western Norway in 1988. Symptoms were assessed
by the
Impact of Event Scale (IES), semi-structured interviews, and a questionnaire
developed for
this study. At the 1-year follow-up, large proportions of the sample had
symptoms of
Intrusion and Avoidance (IES) and symptoms of general psychological distress,
but no
clinically significant symptoms were observed at the 3-year follow-up.
Girls and children
who experienced loss in the accident were characterised by high levels
of Intrusion, whereas
passenger trauma and age were unrelated to the outcome. A bidirectional
relationship was
observed between the mothers' and the children's symptoms over
time, whereas the fathers'
symptoms were unrelated to the children's symptoms. The clinical implications
of the study
are that symptoms in all children of traumatised families deserve attention
during the first
year post-trauma, and that objective risk indicators (age, sex, and types
of trauma) do not
provide sufficient information to identify children at risk.