Posttraumatic Growth in Low-Income Black Mothers Who Survived Hurricane Katrina

This mixed-methods study aimed to gain knowledge of the lived experience of posttraumatic growth (PTG) in 32 low-income Black mothers whose New Orleans' homes were damaged or destroyed by Hurricane Katrina, and half of whom had relocated indefinitely to Houston. Data from in-depth interviews with participants were examined in conjunction with quantitative scores on the Posttraumatic Growth Inventory (PTGI; Tedeschi & Calhoun, 1996). Participants were interviewed face-to-face on a range of postdisaster experiences, including positive changes, in 2009. Participants also completed the PTGI via a telephone survey within six months of being interviewed. Most (26 out of 32) participants described experiencing PTG within the 5 domains of the PTGI, with the domains most frequently coded, in descending order, being New Possibilities, Relating to Others, Personal Strength, Appreciation for Life, and Spiritual Change. PTG stemmed heavily from exposure to opportunities in survivors' postdisaster communities, including increased racial diversity, improved neighborhoods, and new educational and economic opportunities. Participants' frequency of all PTG codes was associated with their overall PTGI scores with a small-to-moderate effect size (r=.32; p=.078) in a relationship that trended toward significance. Without minimizing the catastrophic losses they entail, disasters may in some cases create spaces for PTG for survivors, including through new opportunities in areas where survivors formerly experienced oppression. Policymakers should examine how to make such opportunities available, visible and accessible to individuals absent a disaster. Public Policy Relevance Statement This study suggests that although natural disasters disproportionately negatively impact individuals with oppressed statuses predisaster-for example, in the United States, women, Blacks, and low-income individuals are much more severely harmed by disasters-in some cases, natural disasters and subsequent relocation can also shake loose some of the entrenched structures of oppression and allow for posttraumatic growth (PTG) related to a reduction in experiences of race-, gender-, and socioeconomic-based oppression. This study highlights that along with more intra-and interpersonally driven growth in the 4 PTG domains of Relating to Others, Personal Strength, Appreciation for Life, and Spiritual Change, Hurricane Katrina precipitated PTG in the New Possibilities domain for our participants that was related to postdisaster experiences of greater equality. Policymakers, clinicians, and others should be attentive to ways in which the aftermath of disasters can provide space to create, and to make visible and accessible, opportunities for oppressed and underserved populations aimed at reducing the impact of racism, sexism and poverty-related oppression. More broadly, this study points to the pressing need to create such policies, absent a trauma or disaster, to assist individuals facing the same obstacles as our participants in accessing similar opportunities.