Denise Saint Arnault
Biographic Data
| ID | 78086 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Denise Saint Arnault |
| GIVEN NAMES | Denise |
| FAMILY NAME | Saint Arnault |
| SIGNATURE | SAINT ARNAULT D |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Michigan |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-4436-8347 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 37 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 24 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 37 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2006 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Psychometric Evaluation of Barriers to Help-Seeking-Trauma Scale in Turkish Violence Survivors
Gender-based violence (GBV) is a significant global public health and human rights issue. Despite experiencing violence, many survivors hesitate to seek professional help due to individual, social, and cultural barriers. Understanding these barriers is essential for improving access to support services. The Barriers to Help-Seeking – Trauma Version (BHS-TR) Scale was developed to identify such barriers across different cultural contexts. This stu…
Global Voices of Trauma Recovery
Minimal research has examined culturally nuanced healing experiences across national landscapes, highlighting the need for a comprehensive understanding of culturally relevant healing experiences for survivors of gender-based violence (GBV). This paper explores these experience among 136 survivors of GBV across seven global contexts. Using the Clinical Ethnographic Narrative Interview-Trauma, after reflecting on their healing journey, survivors s…
Psychometric Properties of the Trauma Coping Self-Efficacy Scale in Turkish Female Survivors of Gender-Based Violence
High-risk pregnant women's perceptions of their condition
This qualitative study was carried out with 30 high-risk pregnant women from a Brazilian referral service in women's health. The objective was to analyze the perception of participants regarding their condition, emphasizing their psychosocial needs, to deepen the understanding of subjective, relational, and sociocultural aspects associated with high-risk pregnancy. Data were collected through interviews and participant observation and then explor…
Protective Factors Affecting Trauma Recovery Among Female South Asian Immigrant Intimate Partner Violence Survivors
Intimate partner violence (IPV) is a pressing public health issue affecting women worldwide. Thirty percent of women experience some form of violence throughout their lifetime globally, and South Asian countries have a higher prevalence of IPV (33%–51%). Notably, IPV has detrimental psychological impacts not only on women but also on their children. Despite this, limited empirical attention has explored protective factors for IPV trauma recovery.…
A Feasibility and Acceptability Assessment of Photo-experiencing and Reflective Listening (Pearl)
Photo-experiencing and Reflective Listening (PEARL) is a trauma-informed intervention developed to promote recovery engagement in survivors of gender-based violence (GBV). This study aimed to understand the feasibility and acceptability of PEARL and identify potential healing elements. GBV survivors were recruited in Philadelphia through an online survey ( n = 20). Participants completed the PEARL intervention, a postintervention survey, and a fo…
Psychometric Evaluation of a Multicultural Instrument
Establishing a Cutoff Score for the Healing after Gender-based Violence Scale (GBV-Heal)
Purpose To evaluate a cutoff score for the Healing after Gender-based Violence Scale (GBV-Heal)—an instrument to assess recovery progress for survivors of GBV. Methods We surveyed 321 women-identifying GBV survivors living in the Midwestern United States from April to December 2022 to evaluate their mental health symptom burden, trauma coping self-efficacy, sense of meaning, healing progress, and recovery stage. We used Receiver Operating Charact…
Enhancing the Recovery Process for Undergraduate Women Survivors of Sexual Violence
The psychosocial impact of sexual violence (SV) on college-aged women necessitates understanding positive influences of survivors’ healing processes. The purpose of this study, therefore, was to investigate facilitators in the healing journey for undergraduate SV survivors. Seventeen women were interviewed using Photo-experiencing and Reflective Listening (PEARL). Thematic analysis revealed three core facilitators: (a) Support—formal and informal…
Entrevista Narrativa Etnográfica Clínica Sobre a Experiência De Mulheres Egressas Do Sistema Prisional
Objetivos analisar a percepção de mulheres egressas do sistema prisional sobre os principais estressores que marcaram suas trajetórias de vida e discutir a viabilidade da técnica Entrevista Narrativa Etnográfica Clínica para facilitar a narrativa desse grupo. Método pesquisa narrativa desenvolvida em um dispositivo de proteção social do interior de São Paulo. Os dados foram coletados em 2021 (janeiro e fevereiro) utilizando a técnica Entrevista N…
Clinical Ethnographic Narrative Interview About the Experience of Women Discharged From the Prison System
Objectives to analyze the perception of women discharged from the prison system about the main stressors that marked their life trajectories and to discuss the feasibility of the Clinical Ethnographic Narrative Interview technique to facilitate the narrative of this group. Method narrative research developed in a social protection center in the interior of São Paulo. Data were collected in 2021 (January and February) using the Clinical Ethnograph…
Healing After Violence
This study investigated the Turkish validity and reliability of the Healing After Gender-based Violence Scale (GBV-Heal) and the relationship between social support perception, posttraumatic growth in university students who are victims of gender-based violence. The study sample consisted of 167 female students who experienced gender-based violence. The Turkish version of GBV-Heal of Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin value was 0.892; the Bartlett Sphericity Tes…
The Post-Traumatic Growth Journey of Women Who Have Survived Intimate Partner Violence
Suffering intimate partner violence (IPV) is a devastating personal experience and post-traumatic growth (PTG) is a positive, psychological change in a person, following trauma such as IPV. There is a gap in the literature when it comes to theories on PTG after surviving IPV. The aim of this theory development was to synthesize an approach to understanding the PTG journey of female IPV survivors. According to our theory, their PTG journey include…
Knitting Together the Lines Broken Apart”
This study highlights the importance of incorporating individuals' cultures and their phase, needs, and personal self-development timeframes when developing trauma integration interventions
Using Mixed Methods Integration to Evaluate the Structure of Help-Seeking Barriers Scale
Despite the high prevalence of adverse health and trauma-related outcomes associated with intimate partner violence (IPV), help-seeking and service utilization among survivors is low. This study is part of a larger mixed-methods and survivor-centered validation study on the Icelandic Barriers to Help-Seeking for Trauma (BHS-TR) scale, a new barriers measure focused on trauma recovery. A mixed-methods legitimation strategy of integration was emplo…
Trauma Recovery Rubric
Research is beginning to examine gender-based violence (GBV) survivors' recovery, but little is known about diverse recovery trajectories or their relationships with other distress and recovery variables. This interdisciplinary, international multisite mixed-method study developed and used the TRR to identify and classify survivors' trauma pathways. This study describes the phases of the initial development of the preliminary TRR (Phase 1), refin…
The Reliability and Predictive Validity of Sense of Coherence Scale for American Survivors of Gender-Based Violence
This study investigated the reliability and predictive validity of the Sense of Coherence (SOC) scale for 299 American survivors of gender-based violence (GBV). First, confirmatory factor analysis examined the construct validity of the SOC-13. Then, relationships between SOC and clinical scales were examined. Confirmatory factor analysis supported the 3-factor solution, and Cronbach's alpha reliability values for comprehensibility, manageability,…
Breasts, Butts, and Thighs—Oh My! Weight Spurt and Body Image Messages in Girls’ Puberty Books
Analyze popular girls’ puberty books to understand what messages they portray about weight spurt and body image. A critical ethnography was conducted of 13 best-selling books about girls’ puberty. This analysis specifically focused on messages about weight gain/spurt and body image presented in the books and whether these were aligned with larger cultural understandings of weight gain and body image. A data-driven thematic analysis was conducted …
Conceptualizing culture in (global) mental health
Social Media Preference and Condom Use Behaviors
Background. African American adolescents and young adults have an increased likelihood of engaging in risky sexual behaviors. With rising rates of sexually transmitted infections among this population, deeper consideration is now being focused on using social media to engage, educate, and improve sexual behavior in this group. Purpose. To determine why social media is useful and how it may affect the attitude, norms, and perceived behavioral cont…
The Diné (Navajo) Hózhó Lifeway
Purpose: Hózhó is the cultural wisdom that guides the Diné lifeway. This study examines understanding of cultural wisdom (CW) across three generations: elders, adults, and adolescents. Method: A focused ethnography was conducted on the Navajo Nation. Twenty-two Diné (Navajo) were recruited through convenience sampling. Data were collected via two semistructured interviews and photovoice methods. Data were analyzed using content analysis, thematic…
Comparative Ethnographic Narrative Analysis Method
Narrative data analysis aims to understand the stories' content, structure, or function. However narrative data can also be used to examine how context influences self-concepts, relationship dynamics, and meaning-making. This methodological paper explores the potential of narrative analysis to discover and compare the processes by which culture shapes selfhood and meaning making. We describe the development of the Comparative Ethnographic Narrati…
The Healing after Gender-Based Violence Scale (GBV-Heal)
Current literature has primarily equated gender-based violence recovery with an improvement of physical or mental health symptoms, causing a gap in our understanding of the impact of interventions beyond the amelioration of adverse symptomology. The purpose of this research was to create an instrument to holistically measure gender-based violence recovery based on survivor healing goals. Ethnographic interviews were conducted in women-identifying…
Experience of Vulnerable Women Narrated through the Body-Mapping Technique
Vulnerable women are considered a priority in public policies and research agendas. It is necessary to understand better the specificities of their daily lives and the meanings they attribute to their experiences, as this undoubtedly contributes to more grounded and culturally appropriate practices. Additionally, innovative techniques in qualitative research are demanded in academia. This narrative research study was carried out with fourteen wom…
Understanding and Measuring Help-Seeking Barriers among Intimate Partner Violence Survivors
Intimate partner violence (IPV) against women is a global human rights violation of vast proportions and a severe public health problem. Despite high rates of adverse outcomes related to IPV, help-seeking and service utilization among survivors is low. This exploratory sequential mixed-methods study using a combined etic-emic approach describes the validation of the Icelandic Barriers to Help-Seeking for Trauma (BHS-TR) scale. The qualitative pha…
The Clinical Ethnographic Interview
Transcultural nursing, psychiatry, and medical anthropology have theorized that practitioners and researchers need more flexible instruments to gather culturally relevant illness experience, meaning, and help seeking. The state of the science is sufficiently developed to allow standardized yet ethnographically sound protocols for assessment. However, vigorous calls for culturally adapted assessment models have yielded little real change in routin…
Finding the Strength to Heal
Little research has focused on the trauma healing processes of gender-based violence (GBV) survivors, with most research focusing on adverse outcomes. The purpose of this study, therefore, was to explore the nature of GBV healing through survivor narratives. Our analysis revealed important barriers and facilitators of trauma healing. Social context was discovered to have a powerful influence over both barriers and facilitators. Analysis of the na…
Psychometric Evaluation of the Healing After Gender-Based Violence Scale
These findings substantiate the reliability and validity of our instrument as an outcome measure that can be used both cross-sectionally and longitudinally with survivors of GBV
Conceptual Development and Content Validation of a Multicultural Instrument to Assess the Normalization of Gender-Based Violence against Women
The normalization of gender-based violence (GBV) consists of all those cultural beliefs and values that sustain, justify, or minimize GBV perpetration. Acknowledging the lack of instruments addressing the normalization of GBV and its constitutive sociocultural dimensions, this article presents the conceptual development and initial validation of the Normalization of gender-based violence against women scale. This 18-item instrument could be used …
Healing is not linear
The purpose of this study was to describe the day‐to‐day healing processes of women who experienced undergraduate sexual violence. We engaged 19 women in a photo‐elicitation experience with follow‐up individual interviews to identify themes of both healing and darker moments in survivors' everyday lives. Healing was found to function on a continuum influenced by darker moments (i.e., moments that elicited fear, anxiety, loneliness, guilt, anger, …
RO1 Funding for Mixed Methods Research
Mixed methods research has made significant in-roads in the effort to examine complex health related phenomenon. However, little has been published on the funding of mixed methods research projects. This paper addresses that gap by presenting an example of an NIMH funded project using a mixed methods QUAL-QUAN triangulation design entitled "The Mixed-Method Analysis of Japanese Depression." We present the Cultural Determinants of Health Seeking m…
Somatic and Depressive Symptoms in Female Japanese and American Students
The present study examined the relationship between common somatic symptoms and depression in samples of Japanese and American college students. Fifty Japanese and 44 American women completed the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) and rated 56 somatic-distress items for 7 days. Japanese had higher levels of somatic distress than Americans. ANOVA of somatic distress by BDI-level revealed that the High BDI Japanese group reported 26 somatic symptoms (…
Healing After Violence
This study investigated the Turkish validity and reliability of the Healing After Gender-based Violence Scale (GBV-Heal) and the relationship between social support perception, posttraumatic growth in university students who are victims of gender-based violence. The study sample consisted of 167 female students who experienced gender-based violence. The Turkish version of GBV-Heal of Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin value was 0.892; the Bartlett Sphericity Tes…
Conceptualizing culture in (global) mental health
Understanding Trauma Normativeness, Normalization, and Help Seeking in Homeless Mothers
Although trauma-informed approaches guide services to families experiencing homelessness, more emphasis is placed on securing housing than addressing underlying trauma contributing to housing instability. Examining the stories of 29 homeless and/or unstably housed mothers within the broader literature on family trauma and violence, chronic illness, and cultural aspects of family functioning, we define the process of trauma normativeness and norma…
Social networks and the maintenance of conformity
Asian immigrant women have the lowest utilization of mental health services of any ethnic minority (Garland, Lau, Yeh & McCabe 2005). Because help seeking for distress occurs within social networks, we examined how social networks supported or disabled help seeking for Japanese sojourners living in the US. Unfortunately, most of the literature about Japanese social relationships focuses on men in organizational settings. This study used intensive…
Somatic and Depressive Symptoms in Female Japanese and American Students
The present study examined the relationship between common somatic symptoms and depression in samples of Japanese and American college students. Fifty Japanese and 44 American women completed the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) and rated 56 somatic-distress items for 7 days. Japanese had higher levels of somatic distress than Americans. ANOVA of somatic distress by BDI-level revealed that the High BDI Japanese group reported 26 somatic symptoms (…
Social networks and the maintenance of conformity
Asian immigrant women have the lowest utilization of mental health services of any ethnic minority (Garland, Lau, Yeh & McCabe 2005). Because help seeking for distress occurs within social networks, we examined how social networks supported or disabled help seeking for Japanese sojourners living in the US. Unfortunately, most of the literature about Japanese social relationships focuses on men in organizational settings. This study used intensive…
RO1 Funding for Mixed Methods Research
Mixed methods research has made significant in-roads in the effort to examine complex health related phenomenon. However, little has been published on the funding of mixed methods research projects. This paper addresses that gap by presenting an example of an NIMH funded project using a mixed methods QUAL-QUAN triangulation design entitled "The Mixed-Method Analysis of Japanese Depression." We present the Cultural Determinants of Health Seeking m…
Nursing and Globalization in the Americas
The Clinical Ethnographic Interview
Transcultural nursing, psychiatry, and medical anthropology have theorized that practitioners and researchers need more flexible instruments to gather culturally relevant illness experience, meaning, and help seeking. The state of the science is sufficiently developed to allow standardized yet ethnographically sound protocols for assessment. However, vigorous calls for culturally adapted assessment models have yielded little real change in routin…
Understanding Trauma Normativeness, Normalization, and Help Seeking in Homeless Mothers
Although trauma-informed approaches guide services to families experiencing homelessness, more emphasis is placed on securing housing than addressing underlying trauma contributing to housing instability. Examining the stories of 29 homeless and/or unstably housed mothers within the broader literature on family trauma and violence, chronic illness, and cultural aspects of family functioning, we define the process of trauma normativeness and norma…
Testing the influence of cultural determinants on help-seeking theory
Despite increased risks for mental health problems, East Asian immigrant women have the lowest overall service-utilization rates of any cultural group in the United States. Although the influence of cultural processes as the cause of low service use is widely speculated, no empirical study has tested cultural determinants (including culturally specific idioms of distress, culture-based illness interpretations, or concerns about social consequence…
Finding the Strength to Heal
Little research has focused on the trauma healing processes of gender-based violence (GBV) survivors, with most research focusing on adverse outcomes. The purpose of this study, therefore, was to explore the nature of GBV healing through survivor narratives. Our analysis revealed important barriers and facilitators of trauma healing. Social context was discovered to have a powerful influence over both barriers and facilitators. Analysis of the na…
Reconsidering rigor in psychological science
Healing is not linear
The purpose of this study was to describe the day‐to‐day healing processes of women who experienced undergraduate sexual violence. We engaged 19 women in a photo‐elicitation experience with follow‐up individual interviews to identify themes of both healing and darker moments in survivors' everyday lives. Healing was found to function on a continuum influenced by darker moments (i.e., moments that elicited fear, anxiety, loneliness, guilt, anger, …
Social Media Preference and Condom Use Behaviors
Background. African American adolescents and young adults have an increased likelihood of engaging in risky sexual behaviors. With rising rates of sexually transmitted infections among this population, deeper consideration is now being focused on using social media to engage, educate, and improve sexual behavior in this group. Purpose. To determine why social media is useful and how it may affect the attitude, norms, and perceived behavioral cont…
The Diné (Navajo) Hózhó Lifeway
Purpose: Hózhó is the cultural wisdom that guides the Diné lifeway. This study examines understanding of cultural wisdom (CW) across three generations: elders, adults, and adolescents. Method: A focused ethnography was conducted on the Navajo Nation. Twenty-two Diné (Navajo) were recruited through convenience sampling. Data were collected via two semistructured interviews and photovoice methods. Data were analyzed using content analysis, thematic…
Comparative Ethnographic Narrative Analysis Method
Narrative data analysis aims to understand the stories' content, structure, or function. However narrative data can also be used to examine how context influences self-concepts, relationship dynamics, and meaning-making. This methodological paper explores the potential of narrative analysis to discover and compare the processes by which culture shapes selfhood and meaning making. We describe the development of the Comparative Ethnographic Narrati…
The Healing after Gender-Based Violence Scale (GBV-Heal)
Current literature has primarily equated gender-based violence recovery with an improvement of physical or mental health symptoms, causing a gap in our understanding of the impact of interventions beyond the amelioration of adverse symptomology. The purpose of this research was to create an instrument to holistically measure gender-based violence recovery based on survivor healing goals. Ethnographic interviews were conducted in women-identifying…
Experience of Vulnerable Women Narrated through the Body-Mapping Technique
Vulnerable women are considered a priority in public policies and research agendas. It is necessary to understand better the specificities of their daily lives and the meanings they attribute to their experiences, as this undoubtedly contributes to more grounded and culturally appropriate practices. Additionally, innovative techniques in qualitative research are demanded in academia. This narrative research study was carried out with fourteen wom…
Understanding and Measuring Help-Seeking Barriers among Intimate Partner Violence Survivors
Intimate partner violence (IPV) against women is a global human rights violation of vast proportions and a severe public health problem. Despite high rates of adverse outcomes related to IPV, help-seeking and service utilization among survivors is low. This exploratory sequential mixed-methods study using a combined etic-emic approach describes the validation of the Icelandic Barriers to Help-Seeking for Trauma (BHS-TR) scale. The qualitative pha…
Conceptual Development and Content Validation of a Multicultural Instrument to Assess the Normalization of Gender-Based Violence against Women
The normalization of gender-based violence (GBV) consists of all those cultural beliefs and values that sustain, justify, or minimize GBV perpetration. Acknowledging the lack of instruments addressing the normalization of GBV and its constitutive sociocultural dimensions, this article presents the conceptual development and initial validation of the Normalization of gender-based violence against women scale. This 18-item instrument could be used …
Psychometric Evaluation of the Healing After Gender-Based Violence Scale
These findings substantiate the reliability and validity of our instrument as an outcome measure that can be used both cross-sectionally and longitudinally with survivors of GBV
The Post-Traumatic Growth Journey of Women Who Have Survived Intimate Partner Violence
Suffering intimate partner violence (IPV) is a devastating personal experience and post-traumatic growth (PTG) is a positive, psychological change in a person, following trauma such as IPV. There is a gap in the literature when it comes to theories on PTG after surviving IPV. The aim of this theory development was to synthesize an approach to understanding the PTG journey of female IPV survivors. According to our theory, their PTG journey include…
Knitting Together the Lines Broken Apart”
This study highlights the importance of incorporating individuals' cultures and their phase, needs, and personal self-development timeframes when developing trauma integration interventions
Using Mixed Methods Integration to Evaluate the Structure of Help-Seeking Barriers Scale
Despite the high prevalence of adverse health and trauma-related outcomes associated with intimate partner violence (IPV), help-seeking and service utilization among survivors is low. This study is part of a larger mixed-methods and survivor-centered validation study on the Icelandic Barriers to Help-Seeking for Trauma (BHS-TR) scale, a new barriers measure focused on trauma recovery. A mixed-methods legitimation strategy of integration was emplo…
Trauma Recovery Rubric
Research is beginning to examine gender-based violence (GBV) survivors' recovery, but little is known about diverse recovery trajectories or their relationships with other distress and recovery variables. This interdisciplinary, international multisite mixed-method study developed and used the TRR to identify and classify survivors' trauma pathways. This study describes the phases of the initial development of the preliminary TRR (Phase 1), refin…
The Reliability and Predictive Validity of Sense of Coherence Scale for American Survivors of Gender-Based Violence
This study investigated the reliability and predictive validity of the Sense of Coherence (SOC) scale for 299 American survivors of gender-based violence (GBV). First, confirmatory factor analysis examined the construct validity of the SOC-13. Then, relationships between SOC and clinical scales were examined. Confirmatory factor analysis supported the 3-factor solution, and Cronbach's alpha reliability values for comprehensibility, manageability,…
Breasts, Butts, and Thighs—Oh My! Weight Spurt and Body Image Messages in Girls’ Puberty Books
Analyze popular girls’ puberty books to understand what messages they portray about weight spurt and body image. A critical ethnography was conducted of 13 best-selling books about girls’ puberty. This analysis specifically focused on messages about weight gain/spurt and body image presented in the books and whether these were aligned with larger cultural understandings of weight gain and body image. A data-driven thematic analysis was conducted …
Conceptualizing culture in (global) mental health
Psychology (32 works) · Medicine (21 works) · Clinical Psychology (19 works) · Social Psychology (18 works) · Sociology (18 works) · Clinical Psychology (16 works) · Psychiatry (16 works) · Intimate Partner and Family Violence (13 works) · Social Psychology (12 works) · Migration, Health and Trauma (11 works)