Research & Publications
Katie’s research interests focus on the cultural expression of post-traumatic stress and grief reactions in children and adults. She completed her Ph.D. in Aceh, Indonesia with this interest in mind and went on to conduct an RCT of an adapted trauma-focused and problem-solving treatment for primary school-aged children.
She has since worked alongside the World Health Organization in Pakistan, Kenya, Nepal, Lebanon and Fiji testing out a brief, transdiagnostic intervention that can be delivered by lay counsellors. Katie is particularly interested in training non-specialised health professionals and lay workers to deliver psychological interventions in contexts where access to psychological services are limited (“task-shifting”). PM+
More recently, she has been involved in an EU project supporting the testing and implementation of psychological interventions for Syrian refugees. Katie has delivered training-of-trainers and supervisors for this project. STRENGTHS
Katie is currently involved in the development and testing of online group interventions supporting people affected by COVID-19. To date, these interventions have been trialed across Australia and a trial is underway in India.
Selected Publications
Book chapters :
Dawson, K.S. & Rahman, A. (2018). Low intensity interventions for psychological symptoms following mass trauma. In N. Morina & A. Nickerson (Eds.), Mental Health of Refugee and Conflict-Affected Populations: Theory, Research and Clinical Practice. Springer, pp. 341-356.
Dawson, K. & Bryant, R.A. (2013). Developing a theoretical model of child responses to disaster and conflict in the context of Islam, In R. Pat-Horenczyk, D. Brom, C. Chemtob, & J. Vogel. (Eds.), Helping Children Cope with Trauma: Individual, Family and Community Perspectives. Taylor and Francis, East Sussex, UK, pp. 210-223.
Articles:
Bryant, R.A., Bawaneh, A., Awwad, M., Al-Hayek, H., Giardinelli, L., Whitney, C., Jordans, M.J.D., Cuijpers, P., Sijbrandij, M., Ventevogel, P., Dawson, K., & Akhtar, A. on behalf of the STRENGTHS Consortium (in press). Effectiveness of a brief group behavioral intervention for common mental disorders in Syrian refugees in Jordan: A randomized clinical trial. PLOS Medicine.
Bryant, R.A., Dawson, K.S., Keyan, D., Azevedo, S., Yadav, S., Tran, J., Rawson, N., Harvey, S. (2022). Effectiveness of a Videoconferencing-Delivered Psychological Intervention for Mental Health Problems during COVID-19: A Proof-of-Concept Randomized Clinical Trial. Psychotherapy & Psychosomatics;91(1):63-72.
Dawson, K.S., Watts, S., et al., (2019). Improving Access to Effective Interventions for Young Adolescents: Early Adolescent Skills for Emotions (EASE). World Psychiatry, 18, 105.
Dawson, K.S., et al. (2017). A controlled trial of trauma-focused therapy versus problem-solving in Islamic children affected by civil conflict and disaster in Aceh, Indonesia, Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry https://doi.org/10.1177/0004867417714333
Dawson, K.S., et al. (2016). Feasibility trial of a scalable psychological intervention for women affected by urban adversity and gender-based violence in Nairobi, BMC Psychiatry, 16(1), 410.
Dawson, K.S. & Bryant, R.A. (2016). Children’s vantage point of recalling traumatic events, PLoS ONE, 11.
Dawson, K.S., et al. (2015). Problem management plus (PM+): A WHO transdiagnostic psychological intervention for common mental health problems. World Psychiatry, 14, 354.
Dawson, K.S., et al. (2014). Predictors of Chronic Posttraumatic Response in Muslim Children Following Natural Disaster, Psychological Trauma: Theory, Research, Practice, and Policy, 6(5), 580.