2009 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

Japanese Schoolchildren's Experience of Mass Evacuation in World War II and Its long-term influence on their Later Life.

Research Project

Project/Area Number	19592608
Research Category	Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
Allocation Type	Single-year Grants
Section	一般
Research Field	Community health/Gerontological nurisng
Research Institution	Kitasato University
Principal Investigator	DEGUCHI Sachiko Kitasato University, 看護学部, 教授 (00269507)
Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha)	TAKEI Asako 日本赤十字看護大学, 看護学部 (70216836)
Project Period (FY)	2007 – 2009
Keywords	戦争体験 / 学童疎開 / 集団生活 / 心的外傷後ストレス障害
Research Abstract	In Japan, five hundred eighty thousand children at their school age experienced the mass evacuation from their home during World War II . Ten survivors of the mass evacuation were interviewed regarding their experiences and influences on their later lives. As a result, the common experiences like hunger, bullying and helplessness were identified. But there were people who had traumatized by the devastating events during/after the mass evacuation. For example some of them had been feeling guilty from witnessing his/her friend's death and some had to live their lives as orphans as they lost whole families by the air laid in Tokyo. Their narratives suggested that there were many aged people who had to go through multiple traumas during /after the mass evacuation and were afflicted by those traumatic experiences still now.