Postdoctoral Research Fellow  Dr. Anna Sergiienko

Dr. Anna Sergiienko is a clinical psychologist and researcher whose research interests focus on the psychological consequences of war and forced migration. Her work particularly addresses the transformation of basic beliefs, posttraumatic growth, and mentalization. Anna received her doctoral degree in psychology in 2022. Since 2023, she has worked at the Institute for Psychosocial Prevention and Psychotherapy at Heidelberg University Hospital under the supervision of Prof. Svenja Taubner. Her main research project examines the interrelations between the transformation of basic beliefs, mentalization, and posttraumatic growth among people from Ukraine who have experienced war and forced migration. Her academic work combines empirical research with clinical psychological practice. Over the past three and a half years, she has provided individual psychological counselling to refugees from Ukraine affected by war and forced displacement. As part of her research project, she also conducts psychological group interventions with refugees from Ukraine. Within the Research Training Group “Ambivalent Enmity,” her research interests are connected to the field “Enemy Contact” and to a psychological perspective on the study of enmity. In particular, she is interested in the psychological processes associated with experiences of war and contact with the enemy, as well as potential changes in representations of the self and others, identity, and basic beliefs. In this new research context, she is also interested in further developing her research on acculturative stress and progress.