Literature highlights that during war, generally defined as a “men’s affair”, women represent one of the most vulnerable groups, alongside children and youths. Consistently, research investigating the impact of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict on mental health has evidenced that Ukrainian women are at higher risk of developing psychopathological and psychological disturbances compared to men. Therefore, there is a need for an in-depth investigation into how psychological research explores and delves into the psychological health status and experiences of Ukrainian women during the current armed conflict. Following PRISMA guidelines, a systematic review was performed across the databases Scopus, PubMed, Web of Knowledge, and PsycArticles. The search encompassed the broad topic of psychological research on women during the Russian-Ukrainian conflict and was limited to the following inclusion criteria: research papers adopting a gender-sensitive lens on women; referring to the current conflict started in 2022; written in English. Out of a total 20 articles, only 7 studies were considered suitable for the review. Three main research trajectories were identified: (1) Women who take care of women; (2) Where war destroys, something is re-born; (3) Violence and Resistance. Overall, research on this topic appears to still be underdeveloped. Given the vulnerability of this target population, which also constitutes the main group forced to leave the country, there is a need for an increase in studies adopting a gender-sensitive approach on this issue. The emerged research trajectories summarize the main thematic areas investigated by the international scientific community on this topic. From our perspective, these may also give interesting insights to hypothesize the way in which current psychological research tries to “deal with” the extreme trauma of the war and the feminine issue. From this point of view, the mainly female-guided studies show a peculiar form of care/research that seems to find a way to “combat” the foreign aspects of war by identifying similarities with the other. Additionally, the focus on perinatal experiences and different forms of female resistance seems to testify the tendency of research to prioritise its attention to the undeniable supremacy of life over the death inflicted by war.

THE FEMININE AND THE WAR: A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW ON GENDER-SENSITIVE RESEARCH DURING THE RUSSIA-UKRAINE WAR

Gallo, Marica
Methodology
;
Tessitore, Francesca
Conceptualization
2024-01-01

Abstract

Literature highlights that during war, generally defined as a “men’s affair”, women represent one of the most vulnerable groups, alongside children and youths. Consistently, research investigating the impact of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict on mental health has evidenced that Ukrainian women are at higher risk of developing psychopathological and psychological disturbances compared to men. Therefore, there is a need for an in-depth investigation into how psychological research explores and delves into the psychological health status and experiences of Ukrainian women during the current armed conflict. Following PRISMA guidelines, a systematic review was performed across the databases Scopus, PubMed, Web of Knowledge, and PsycArticles. The search encompassed the broad topic of psychological research on women during the Russian-Ukrainian conflict and was limited to the following inclusion criteria: research papers adopting a gender-sensitive lens on women; referring to the current conflict started in 2022; written in English. Out of a total 20 articles, only 7 studies were considered suitable for the review. Three main research trajectories were identified: (1) Women who take care of women; (2) Where war destroys, something is re-born; (3) Violence and Resistance. Overall, research on this topic appears to still be underdeveloped. Given the vulnerability of this target population, which also constitutes the main group forced to leave the country, there is a need for an increase in studies adopting a gender-sensitive approach on this issue. The emerged research trajectories summarize the main thematic areas investigated by the international scientific community on this topic. From our perspective, these may also give interesting insights to hypothesize the way in which current psychological research tries to “deal with” the extreme trauma of the war and the feminine issue. From this point of view, the mainly female-guided studies show a peculiar form of care/research that seems to find a way to “combat” the foreign aspects of war by identifying similarities with the other. Additionally, the focus on perinatal experiences and different forms of female resistance seems to testify the tendency of research to prioritise its attention to the undeniable supremacy of life over the death inflicted by war.
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/11386/4884492
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