Frequent Exposure To Violent Images Results In Psychological Damage

Frequent Exposure To Violent Images Results In Psychological Damage05 Sep 2012-nbsp;-nbsp;-nbsp;



According to a recent study published in Psychological Science, by UC Irvine, frequent exposure to violent images from the Iraq War and the September 11th attacks increases the risk of psychological and physical ailments in U.S. adults.

The trials suggests that there may be long-term effects of "collective traumas", such as terrorist attacks, shootings involving many fatalities, and natural disasters.

Roxane Cohen Silver, UCI professor of psychology - social behavior, medicine and public health commented:

"I would not advocate restricting nor censoring war images for the psychological well-being of the public. Instead, I think it's important for people to be aware that there is no psychological benefit to repeated exposure to graphic images of horror."

The study found that both individuals who watched more than 4 hours of television a day relating to the 9/11 attacks and Iraq War coverage had more acute and post-traumatic stress symptoms in the long run.

The people involved in the study who watched more than four hours a day of 9/11 coverage in the weeks following the attacks suffered from doctor-diagnosed physical problems 2 to 3 years after the attacks.

Those who watched coverage of the Iraq War, particularly images of soldiers in battle and the soldiers who had died, reported symptoms of post traumatic stress.

The authors analyzed individuals' mental and physical health before the 9/11 attacks and asked them about how much media coverage they were exposed to after the acts of terrorism and after the beginning of the Iraq War.

The experts followed up with the participants during the 3 years after 9/11.

Acute stress occurs in the immediate weeks following a traumatic experience, while post-traumatic stress is any time one month later and after.

The authors began to examine stress levels of the volunteers 9 to 14 days after the attacks of 9/11 and a few days after the Iraq War began.


1,322 volunteers were included in the study. Of them, 12% had high acute stress levels after 9/11 and 7% after the start of the Iraq War.

The researchers adjusted the data due to mental health before 9/11, where the participants lived, and how much lifetime exposure the person had been exposed to in their lives. This helped them to determine that people who watched television for 4 or more hours a day had higher incidence of acute stress symptoms.

Silver concluded:

"The results suggest that exposure to graphic media images may be an important mechanism through which the impact of collective trauma is dispersed widely. Our findings are both relevant and timely as vivid images reach larger audiences than ever before through YouTube, social media, and smartphones.

When we consider that graphic images of individuals being overcome by the 2011 tsunami in Japan were shown repeatedly, that a vigorous debate occurred last year regarding the release of the gruesome death photos of Osama bin Laden, and that vivid and disturbing images of 9/11 will likely appear on television marking the anniversary of the attacks, we believe that our paper has something important to say regarding the impact of repeated exposure to graphic traumatic images.

Written by Christine Kearney
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