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Television Images and Psychological Symptoms After the September 11 Terrorist Attacks

Authors:
Jennifer Ahern at University of California, Berkeley
Jennifer Ahern
Sandro Galea at Boston University
Sandro Galea
Heidi Resnick at Medical University of South Carolina
Heidi Resnick
Dean G Kilpatrick at Medical University of South Carolina
Dean G Kilpatrick
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Abstract

Exposure to graphic television images may exacerbate psychological symptoms in disaster situations. We tested the hypotheses that (1) more frequent viewing of television images of the September 11 terrorist attacks was associated with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depression, and that (2) direct exposure to disaster events had an interactive effect with media viewing. We recruited 1,008 adult residents of the borough of Manhattan in New York City through a random-digit-dial telephone survey conducted between October 16 and November 15, 2001. Respondents who repeatedly saw "people falling or jumping from the towers of the World Trade Center" had higher prevalence of PTSD (17.4%) and depression (14.7%) than those who did not (6.2% and 5.3%, respectively). Among respondents who were directly affected by the attacks (e.g., had a friend killed), those who watched this television image frequently were more likely to have PTSD and depression than those who did not. Among respondents not directly affected by the attacks, prevalence of PTSD and depression was not associated with frequency of television image viewing. Specific disaster-related television images were associated with PTSD and depression among persons who were directly exposed to a disaster. Future research should address causal directionality of this association.
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... Given the important role assumed by the media in the 21 st century (namely the television and social networks), which is even more visible in traumatic events such as armed conflicts and the COVID-19 pandemic, the number of studies on the impact that the images and the news transmitted may have on the mental health of people not directly exposed to those events has significantly increased. The greatest development in studies within this area occurred after the September 11 attacks in the United States of America, where a positive correlation was found between the number of hours spent watching the news and the development of depressive symptoms and post-traumatic stress [8][9][10] . Also, a 2014 study carried out in the Gaza Strip after one of the periods in which more missiles were launched into the territory showed that, at that time, there was not only an increase in news consumption, but also a positive relationship between the time spent viewing the news and viewers' development of anxiety symptoms 11 . ...
... The sample from the 97 participants had a median age of 43 years [39-46], 67.1% had secondary school education or higher and 81.4% were of Portuguese nationality. With respect to the children, 59.8% were male, with a median age of 12 years [8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15]. GI accounted for about 46.4% of the sample and GII 53.6% (Table 1). ...
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... The public's response is anticipated to be mild to moderate, except for individuals who are directly exposed to "conventional" terrorist attacks (Ayalon and Lahad, 2000;Boscarino et al., 2002;Galea et al., 2002;Silver et al., 2002). Sensationalizing in the media and public authorities' inadequate implementation of specific suggestions can exacerbate reactions (Slone, 2000;Ahern et al., 2002). Regardless of the accuracy of the information, the public may respond severely in the event of "nonconventional" assaults utilizing chemical, (Boscarino et al., 2003;Foa et al., 2005). ...
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Preprint
Full-text available
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Article
Full-text available
  • Dec 2024
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