Johns Hopkins Guide to Everyday Psychological First Aid

A practical guide for how to offer compassionate, effective support during times of emotional crisis and acute distress.

The Johns Hopkins Guide to Everyday Psychological First Aid equips readers with the tools to respond effectively and compassionately to emotional crises—whether they unfold in a home, workplace, school, or public setting. Based on decades of research, experience, and real-world examples, George S. Everly, Jr, and Jeffrey M. Lating present a streamlined, accessible version of the Johns Hopkins RAPID model of psychological first aid, designed specifically for everyday use by adults without formal training in mental health.

This guide empowers people to step in when someone is struggling—to listen, stabilize apparent distress, and offer effective, meaningful support. Offering advice and practical coping techniques for a variety of situations—like helping a stranger in a moment of panic or responding to the grief of a friend—the scenarios and checklists throughout the book help readers navigate some of life's most difficult moments with clarity and care. This practical manual speaks to a world facing rising anxiety, loneliness, trauma, and loss by offering a simple, evidence-informed method for fostering resilience and restoring connection.

Everly and Lating emphasize that while no one can say the perfect thing in a crisis, everyone can learn how to offer compassion and help when it matters most. By making psychological first aid as accessible as physical first aid, this guide acts as an essential toolkit for being there when someone needs you most.

George S. Everly, Jr, has served on the faculties of the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, and Harvard University. He is a former member of the Johns Hopkins Center for Public Health Preparedness. Jeffrey M. Lating is a professor of psychology at Loyola University Maryland. Everly and Lating are the coauthors of A Clinical Guide to the Treatment of the Human Stress Response and Personality-Guided Therapy for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder.