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Workforce & wellbeing
Growth and distress coexist in volunteer responders
'As Long as You Breathe, Help If You Can': Meaning in Life, Posttraumatic Stress Symptoms and Posttraumatic Growth Among Volunteer First Responders
International Journal of Psychology · 2026-12 · Added 11 October 2026
A mixed-methods study of 123 Israeli volunteer first responders after the October 7 attacks found posttraumatic growth was positively associated with meaning in life, optimism and spiritual well-being, and inversely associated with PTSD symptom severity.
- Study type
- Cross-sectional
- Design
- Convergent mixed-methods cross-sectional study
- Participants
- 123 volunteer first responders
- Main finding
- PTG correlated positively with meaning, spiritual well-being and optimism and negatively with PTSD severity; optimism and spiritual well-being mediated the meaning-to-growth pathway
- Caveat
- Cross-sectional, single organisation, one culturally specific traumatic event — no causal inference
- Bottom line
- Context only
Why it matters in Australia (Medium relevance). Drawn from a volunteer disaster-response organisation in extraordinary circumstances, but the growth-plus-distress coexistence is consistent with what Australian first-responder wellbeing research shows.
Learning goal
Understand how meaning and posttraumatic growth interact with distress in volunteer first responder wellbeing.
More
- Topic: Workforce & wellbeing
- Daily scan: 11 October 2026
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