28/09/2026
🤔What happens when the places in which we seek belonging, recognition and connection are no longer primarily physical places❓
Much of contemporary life is lived within digitally mediated relationships. Social media has become more than a tool we use: it is increasingly a relational environment in which identities are narrated, belonging is negotiated, affirmation is made publicly visible and measurable, and vulnerability can be exposed — often without physical proximity or embodied presence.
At the PsySSA 30th Annual Psychology Congress, I will be presenting:
Towards Digital Oikoi: A Psychopastoral Reflection on Emerging Ecologies of Trauma and Care
In this paper, I introduce the concept of digital ecological trauma to explore how cumulative relational disruptions within digital environments may affect the person as an integrated relational, embodied and spiritual self.
I propose that we begin to understand digital environments as emerging digital oikoi — relational “households” or homes in which identity is formed, recognised, contested and sometimes wounded.
But these spaces need not be understood only through the language of risk and vulnerability. If digital environments have become places in which people genuinely live relationally, they must also become places in which we learn to practise presence, care, meaning-making and responsible accompaniment.
This requires both an ontological shift — recognising digital spaces as real relational environments — and a methodological shift in how psychology, pastoral theology and practices of care engage them.
The paper offers a conceptual foundation for further empirical research into these emerging ecologies of trauma and care.
📍 PsySSA 30th Annual Psychology Congress
📅 Wednesday, 14 October 2026
🕥 10:30–12:30
📌 P-104 | Violence & Trauma
