Experiences of the Ukrainian adolescents during the Russia-Ukraine 2022 War
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/ILS-07-2022-0093 |
| Published date | 10 October 2022 |
| Date | 10 October 2022 |
| Pages | 666-704 |
| Subject Matter | Library & information science,Librarianship/library management,Library & information services |
| Author | Irene Lopatovska,Kirtika Arora,Flita Veleny Fernandes,Anjali Rao,Simona Sivkoff-Livneh,Brianna Stamm |
Experiences of the Ukrainian
adolescents during the
Russia-Ukraine 2022 War
Irene Lopatovska,Kirtika Arora,Flita Veleny Fernandes,Anjali Rao,
Simona Sivkoff-Livneh and Brianna Stamm
School of Information, Pratt Institute, New York, New York, USA
Abstract
Purpose –The study aims to explore the current experiences of Ukrainian adolescents affected by the
Russia-Ukraine war. The study focusedon the changes in adolescents’livescaused by the war, adolescents’
emotional reactions to the disruptions caused by the war, coping strategies employed by adolescents in
dealing with disruptions and the role of information technology in supporting new realities and coping
strategiesof adolescents.
Design/methodology/approach –This study relied on semi-structuredinterviews conducted on Zoom
with 27 Ukrainian adolescents ages 10-18. Participants were recruited using the snowball sampleand came
from various regions of Ukraine.The interview notes and partial transcripts were analyzedusing thematic
analysisto identify the common and unique patterns in participantresponses.
Findings –The interview data revealed the signs of traumatic experiences and various stages and
methods of coping with them. Participants’resilience was supported by external factors, including
families, communities, continuous schooling, ability to talk to friends, information technology, as well
as internal skills, including social competence, problem-solving, critical consciousness, autonomy and
a sense of purpose. Participants shared specific recommendations for improving information
platforms and online content, e.g. making them more accessible and affordable for Ukrainian users,
improving content curation and personalization, creating and promoting Ukrainian content and
others.
Research limitations/implications –Research relied on convenience sampleof participants who had
access to information communicationtechnology (ICT), were aware and had an ability to participate. Field
work is neededto reach out to participants without access to ICT.
Practical implications –This study contains broad recommendations for improving information
technologiesfor the use of Ukrainian adolescents.
Social implications –This research offersthree timely account of the first-hand experiences of Ukrainian
adolescents affected by the Russia-Ukraine war and can inform future work aimed at improving life
conditionsfor teen population.
Originality/value –This study relied on first-handreports of Ukrainian adolescents’experiences, feelings
and coping strategiesduring the first three months of Russia-Ukraine war.The study applied war trauma and
resilience frameworks to interpret the findings and translate some of the findings into practical
recommendationsfor the information science community.
Keywords Adolescence, War, Emotions, Disruption, Trauma, Resilience, Coping strategies,
Well-being, Information Technology, Ukraine, Interviews
Paper type Research paper
The authors are extremely grateful to our participants who lived through traumatic experiences and
found the time to share their stories with us. The work was supported by the Pratt Institute School of
Information Faculty Innovation grant and Dean Anthony Cocciolo.
ILS
123,11/12
666
Received16 July 2022
Revised1 September 2022
2 September2022
Accepted7 September 2022
Informationand Learning
Sciences
Vol.123 No. 11/12, 2022
pp. 666-704
© Emerald Publishing Limited
2398-5348
DOI 10.1108/ILS-07-2022-0093
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
https://www.emerald.com/insight/2398-5348.htm
1. Introduction
In 2020 the world found itself attacked by a sneaky virus that halted our lives and
everything that we take for granted and we entered the new reality of COVID-19 pandemic
rules aiming to contain its deadly effects. Two years later, the world emerged in a new
reality: our work, education and social interactions were altered in ways that caused us
emotional and physical suffering. Even though we are still grappling with the
unprecedented scaleof disruption the pandemic caused in our lives, a less isolated lifestyle is
slowly returning. In the midst of this global recovery, the world founditself again attacked
in a violent, unexpected and devastating way: this time it was not a virus but man-made
missiles. On February 24, Russian weapons began indiscriminate shelling of Ukrainian
cities. Similarly tothe pandemic in which children and elderly were most vulnerable,in time
of war they are vulnerable too (Frounfelker et al.,2019;Gavin et al.,2020). Listening to teen
stories, understanding their experiences is the first step in developing strategies to help
them cope with traumatic consequencesof war.
This article aims to contributeto the body of multidisciplinary research on the effects of
war on adolescents during the unfoldingwar in Ukraine and bearing witness to the physical
and emotional toll the war has on the participantsof this study. The study was developed as
a rapid response to the unexpected disruption, with the aim of highlighting the firsthand
accounts of adolescents who volunteered to discuss what they experienced from the
beginning of the Russian Federation invasion into Ukraine and the following three months
into the war, to create a baseline for future studies that will focus on specific solutions for
improving war-affected teen experiences.Our participants’accounts attest not only to their
personal resilience but also provide an evidence of the trauma this generation of young
Ukrainians is subjected to and will have to be addressed.In addition to relying on resilience
frameworks to explain adolescent coping strategies, the article also discusses multifaceted
relationships of adolescents with information technology and outlines a few
recommendations for professionals involved in the information product design and policy
decisions. As one of the early exploratory studies of adolescents affected by the Russia-
Ukraine war, this workaims to stimulate discussion on how information sciencecommunity
can react to the conflict and supportsome of its most vulnerable victims.
2. Relevant literature
The presented study, grounded in a phenomenological approach (Savolainen, 2008), was
developed to provide an early scholarly account of adolescent experiences of the Russia-
Ukraine war. The study was developed rapidly to capture teen experiences as they were
unfolding. From the onset of the study, we assumed the uniquenessof the situation and our
participants and refrainedfrom developing hypothesis based on prior work (Merriam,2009;
Ashworth, 1996).Some of the literature pertaining to adolescents and war has been reviewed
prior the study. The sources on trauma and resilience were addedlater to better understand
the trends in the data provided by the participants. This section describes a particular
context of the Russia-Ukraine war, introduces adolescents as a unique age group and
discusses war and its traumaticeffects on adolescents. The section also introduces literature
on trauma and several facets of resilience framework that were found in our participants’
accounts.
2.1 Russia-Ukraine war and children
On February 24, 2022, the Russian Federation launched a full-scale military assault into
Ukraine, thus violating its sovereignty and integrity. This has resulted in the death of
thousands of civilians as well as 6.5 million Ukrainians leaving the country and over 8
Ukrainian
adolescents
667
million people internally displaced (Ukraine Emergency, n.d.). Amidst this humanitarian
crisis, children and adolescentsshoulder the brunt of this war and its consequences together
with their families, friendsand fellow citizens. According to UNICEF’s latest figures”nearly
100 days of war in Ukraine have wrought devastating consequences for children at a scale
and speed not seen since the Second World War. Three million children inside Ukraine and
over 2.2 million children in refugee-hosting countries are now in need of humanitarian
assistance. Almost two out of every three children have been displaced by fighting. Based
on reports verified by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, “on average
more than two children are killed andmore than four injured each day in Ukraine –mostly
in attacks using explosiveweapons in populated areas”(UNICEF, 2022).
The unprecedented scale of this ongoing humanitarian disaster is met with global
indignation. Children and adolescents are a focal point for the relief efforts of the
international community. In one of the recent press releases of the United Nations Security
Council from May 12th, 2022, the vast majority of representatives express grave concerns
about the immediate and long-term effects of the war’s devastation on children. The
destruction of schools and hospitalsexacerbates the current situation as it literally destroys
access to lifesaving help and education. The UNICEFs’Deputy Executive Director, Omar
Abdi says: “The war in Ukraine, like all wars, is a child protection and child rights crisis”
(UN Press, 2022). Numerous otherUN members express their concern over the impact of the
war and the indiscriminate effects of trauma on children and civilians, for instance UK’s
representative BarbaraWoodward assesses the situation as carrying “the very real risk of a
lost generation and the continuation of a cycle of violence, caused by Russia’sinvasion and
the devastation it has created”(Ochab,2022).
2.2 Adolescence and war trauma
We were interested in gathering the firsthand accounts of Ukrainian adolescents for several
reasons: a) the historical significance of providing an international outlet and recognition of
their experience of the current war; b) unlike younger children, they have higher level
information processing and verbal skills to share their experiences (Thomas, 2000), and c) they
experience turbulent period in theirlife that is magnified by the major disruption of war.
Adolescence is a period from childhood to adulthood characterized by intense physical,
psychological and social transformation (Orben et al.,2020). These changes include the
development of identity, puberty and the development of primary and secondary sex
characteristics, intellectual abstraction, cultural susceptibility and peer acceptance
(Blakemore and Mills, 2013;Grotevant and Cooper, 1985). As with childhood, adolescent
development is influenced by familialrelationships (Grotevant and Cooper, 1985). However,
this is also a period where building an independent sense-of-self significantly increases
the role of peer relationships and peer evaluation, and often decreases the influence
of the parent(s) relationships (De Goede et al., 2009). During this transition, adolescents
are known to experience emotional difficultiesranging from depression, anxieties and fears
to aggressive and noncompliant behaviors (Friedmann and Thomas, 1995). The significant
physiological and psychologicalchanges that occur during adolescence contributeto a more
complex experienceof trauma such as the war that the Ukrainian adolescents are witnessing
and are subjected to.
War is a traumatic event, defined by the exposure to death, threat of death, actual or
threat of serious injury of self or others, and associated with intense fear, helplessness or
horror (Kleber, 2019;Shaw, 2012). Smith (2001) suggests that the most important variables
that determine the impacts of war on children’s mental health are: deprivation of basic
resources (such as shelter, water, food, schools, health care); disrupted family relationships
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