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SSW Leads Project Tracking Stress Among Afghan Evacuees

School of Social Work faculty Abha Rai, Ph.D. and Maria Vidal de Haymes, Ph.D. are part of a team that recently received a Schreiber Venture Fund grant to study stress levels among Afghan evacuees. The project will require an interdisciplinary team across multiple universities and community organizations in an effort to launch a one-of-a-kind culturally responsive intervention.

Rai, Principal Investigator, and Vidal de Haymes, Co-Prinicipal Investigator received a $48,000 grant for their project "Culturally Responsive Intervention Incorporating AI to Promote Healthy Integration Among Afghan Evacuees in Illinois and Tennessee." Rai also received $5000 to further this work from the Office of Research Services, Loyola University Chicago. This innovative project developed by study lead, Rai in close collaboration with her team, School of Social Work Office of Research Development, community members, and agency, Trellus will focus on stress reduction among recently arriving Afghan evacuees. In addition to providing them with awareness content, the project will also provide participants with a fitness tracker to monitor their sleep and practice mindfulness.

Another unique component of this project has been to develop an interactive platform, called Dost meaning friend, integrating AI that can provide immediate support and a list of resources to Afghans. This project will target about 50-60 newly arriving Afghans both in Chicago and Nashville.

Vidal de Haymes serves as director, and Rai as co-director or the Center for Immigration and Refugee Accompaniment.

“Many of the CIRA projects to date have centered on migrations from the Americas. By focusing on the City’s recently arrived Afghan population, the project advances the CIRA mission to accompany migrants through research that will test prevention and intervention programs that reflect and support the diversity of the Chicago area immigrant, asylum seeker, and refugee population,” said Vidal de Haymes.

"I have always wanted to do community-engaged research,” added Rai. “I love partnering with communities I serve. When I started working with Afghans, I learned about the many needs of the community and started talking with them about ways to help them. It is through these conversations that this project started evolving and now it is with the help of several Afghan community members, agency personnel, and students that this project is coming to life. I am grateful for the opportunity.”

The project is an interdisciplinary, intercollegiate partnership between Loyola's School of Social Work, Department of Anthropology, and Department of Computer Science, as well as a consultant from Nashville, Dr. Mary Lehman Held. The research group will also collaborate with local non-profit Trellus, which provides educational, workforce, and behavioral health services to refugees and immigrants in Chicago.

“We have been providing a variety of services to refugee and immigrant populations in Chicago for 46 years. When newcomers from Afghanistan began arriving, we supported them by helping enroll their children in Trellus charter school (Passages) and assisting families with our employment services to become self-sufficient and feel that Chicago is their new home,” said Trellus Director of Policy and Advocacy Ali Tarok. “This partnership is unique. What makes it special is that Trellus is actively involved as a researcher, not just a data provider. We were included in all steps of this research process.”  

Participants will be asked to track data like sleep duration and quality, steps, activity, and more. Department of Anthropology professor Paula Tallman, Ph.D. will support a group of students tracking and analyzing that bio-data and how it impacts participants' stress levels.

“My role in this project is to examine whether markers of biological stress are impacted by the intervention,” said Tallman. “For example, we are collecting data on blood pressure, heart rate variability, and sleep quality. We know from the literature, and from our own experiences, that stress can negatively impact our sleep and our heart. We have a unique opportunity with this project to investigate whether a culturally-responsive mental health intervention can go beyond the mind, into the body, to affect the most core aspects of our biology.”

George Thiruvathukal, Ph.D. has led the development of the “wellness hub”called Dost for Afghan evacuees. The hub will also include an artificial intelligence service called DostGPT, which can assist the participants with locating important social services. Two Afghan students, Shakila Fro and graduate, Farzana Farzam have closely supported the development of content for this project.

In a few months, the group plans to move their research to Tennessee, where Mary Lehman Held, Ph.D. will initiate the project on a separate Afghan population. From there, the group hopes to apply for federal funding to continue their research.

“Piloting the intervention allows us to explore the extent to which Afghan community members find the approach culturally acceptable and meaningful,” said Held. “We will also learn from our partner providers whether the intervention is feasible within their organizational context. Once we gain insight from participants and providers in Chicago and Nashville regarding which aspects of the intervention are most valuable and in what ways we should make modifications, we will incorporate any needed adaptations and pursue grant funding to test the revised version.”