Shared Trauma During COVID-19 Pandemic Among Social Work Clinicians: A Follow-up Study

Abstract The COVID-19 global pandemic impacted clinical social workers both directly and indirectly through their work with clients. This phenomenon, referred to as shared trauma, speaks to the dual impact of collective trauma on the clinician. Using structural equation modeling (SEM), this study examined a national sample of 3,184 social workers several years after the peak of the pandemic with respect to its personal and professional impact. As hypothesized, insecure attachment, greater exposure to potentially traumatic life events, and distress related to COVID-19 were predictive of higher levels of shared trauma (operationalized as shared traumatic stress, or “ST”). As a mediator, resilience had an inverse relationship with avoidant attachment and enduring pandemic distress and a positive relationship with the experience of a traumatic life event, as well as predicted negative relationship with ST. These results are compared to similar studies on shared trauma. Implications for practice and the need for self-care are also discussed.