Media exposure predicts children's reactions to crime and terrorism

Media Exposure to Armed Conflict: Dispositional Optimism and Self-Mastery Moderate Distress and Post-Traumatic Symptoms among Adolescents

BACKGROUND

Rapid technological developments enable the immediate transmission of armed conflict events through a variety of media channels, inducing mass anxiety, fear, and helplessness. Youth are particularly vulnerable and face new challenges as a result of this exposure. The effects of media exposure to such events on psychological distress and post-traumatic symptoms were examined.

METHODS

A total of 161 participants aged 13-18 years completed a questionnaire battery that included measures of media exposure to armed conflict events, previous direct exposure to armed conflict events, psychological distress, post-traumatic symptoms, dispositional optimism, and self-mastery. A structural equation model (SEM) approach was employed for data analysis.

RESULTS

The extent of media exposure to armed conflict was directly associated with psychological distress and post-traumatic symptoms. Dispositional optimism moderated the association between media exposure and psychological distress, while self-mastery moderated the association between media exposure and post-traumatic symptoms. The effects of the Internet factor of media exposure, which included social media, were particularly disturbing as neither of the resilience factors moderated negative outcomes.

CONCLUSIONS

The findings suggest that clinical interventions to enhance dispositional optimism and self-mastery as well as other potential resilience factors can protect adolescents from the severe effects of media exposure to violent armed conflict events. Developmental and public health implications related to vulnerabilities and resilience during adolescence are discussed.

Trauma and US Minority Children and Youth

PURPOSE OF REVIEW

This paper reviews the literature on the prevalence, risk factors, and effects of traumatic experiences on the mental health outcomes of minority youth in the USA.

RECENT FINDINGS

The USA has an increasing number of children and youth from minority backgrounds. Research reveals that traumatic experiences disproportionately affect minority youth. These experiences include historical/generational trauma, immigration and acculturation stressors, natural and manmade disasters, experiences of discrimination, family violence, and community violence. The COVID-19 pandemic has also disproportionately affected minority youth resulting in illness and hospitalizations. Despite the higher incidence of trauma exposure, minority youth are less likely to access medical and mental health care. These disparities are resulting in increasing rates of depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress, substance use disorders, and suicide in minority youth. Recognizing and understanding the impact of trauma is critical to the healthy development and successful functioning of minority youth, and to the success of our nation.

Youth Anxiety About Political News

This study assessed youth anxiety about political issues and associated characteristics. Caregivers (N = 374) were recruited through Amazon Mechanical Turk and reported on their child's anxiety about 15 voting issues covered in the media since the 2016 presidential election as well as their child's psychological functioning and their own trait anxiety. For the majority of voting issues, over 50% of caregivers indicated that their child experienced at least one related worry; worries about the environment and gun violence were most common. Youth empathy and intolerance of uncertainty were each positively associated with worry about political issues but did not predict such worry after accounting for the effect of youth trait anxiety. Youth with clinical levels of generalized anxiety experienced more severe worry about political issues than did youth with minimal/subthreshold anxiety. Future studies should identify strategies for mitigating the negative impact of political news on youth with anxiety disorders.

Frequency of Improvised Explosive Devices and Suicide Attempts in the U.S. Army

BACKGROUND

Improvised explosive devices (IEDs) were a prominent and initially new threat in the Iraq and Afghanistan war which raised concerns and anticipatory fear in and out of theater. This study examined the association of monthly IED rates with risk of soldier suicide attempt among those deployed and nondeployed.

METHODS

Person-month records for all active duty Regular Army suicide attempters from 2004 through 2009 (n = 9,791) and an equal-probability sample of control person-months (n = 183,826) were identified. Logistic regression analyses examined soldiers' risk of attempting suicide as a function of monthly IED frequency, controlling for sociodemographics, service-related characteristics, rate of deployment/redeployment, and combat deaths and injuries. The association of IED frequency with suicide attempt was examined overall and by time in service and deployment status.

FINDINGS

Soldiers' risk of suicide attempt increased with increasing numbers of IEDs. Suicide attempt was 26% more likely for each 1,000 IED increase in monthly frequency (odds ratio [OR] = 1.26, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 1.22-1.30). The association of IED frequency with suicide attempt was greater for soldiers in their first 2 years of service (OR = 1.30, 95% CI = 1.25-1.36) than for those with 3 or more years of service (OR = 1.18, 95% CI = 1.12-1.24). Among soldiers in their first 2 years of service, the association was constant, regardless of deployment status (χ₂² = 3.89, p = 0.14). Among soldiers with 3 or more years of service, the association was higher for those never deployed (OR = 1.12, 95% CI = 1.01-1.24) and currently deployed (OR = 1.14, 95% CI = 1.05-1.23) than for those previously deployed.

DISCUSSION

To our knowledge, this is the first study to examine and demonstrate an association between the aggregate frequency of IEDs and risk of suicide attempts among U.S. Army soldiers. This association was observed across deployment status and time in service, and for early-career soldiers in particular. The findings suggest that the threat of new weapons may increase stress burden among soldiers. Targeting risk perception and perceived preparedness, particularly early in a soldier's career, may improve psychological resilience and reduce suicide risk.

The Effects of Mediated Exposure to Ethnic-Political Violence on Middle East Youth's Subsequent Post-Traumatic Stress Symptoms and Aggressive Behavior

This study introduces the concept of chronic (i.e., repeated and cumulative) mediated exposure to political violence and investigates its effects on aggressive behavior and post-traumatic stress (PTS) symptoms in young viewers. Embracing the risk-matrix approach, these effects are studied alongside other childhood risk factors that influence maladjustment. A longitudinal study was conducted on a sample of youth who experience the Israeli-Palestinian conflict firsthand (N = 1,207). As hypothesized, higher levels of chronic mediated exposure were longitudinally related to higher levels of PTS symptoms and aggression at peers independently of exposure to violence in other contexts. In the case of aggressive behavior, structural equation analysis (SEM) analyses suggest that, while it is likely there are causal effects in both directions, the bigger effect is probably for exposure to violence stimulating aggression than for aggression stimulating exposure to violence. Both the longitudinal effects on aggression and PTS symptoms were especially strong among youth who demonstrated initially higher levels of the same type of maladjustment. These results support the conceptualization of the relation between media violence and behaviors as "reciprocally determined" or "downward spirals" and highlight the contribution of the risk-matrix approach to the analysis of childhood maladjustment.

Media exposure and sympathetic nervous system reactivity predict PTSD symptoms after the Boston marathon bombings

BACKGROUND

Terrorist attacks have been shown to precipitate posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptomatology in children and adolescents, particularly among youths with high exposure to media coverage surrounding such events. Media exposure may be particularly likely to trigger PTSD symptoms in youths with high physiological reactivity to stress or with prior psychopathology or exposure to violence. We examined the interplay between media exposure, preattack psychopathology, autonomic nervous system (ANS) reactivity, and prior violence exposure in predicting PTSD symptom onset following the terrorist attack at the 2013 Boston Marathon.

METHODS

A community sample of 78 adolescents (mean age = 16.7 years, 65% female) completed a survey about the bombings, including media exposure to the event and PTSD symptoms. All respondents participated in a study assessing psychopathology prior to the attack, and sympathetic and parasympathetic reactivity to a laboratory-based stressor was assessed in a subset (N = 44) of this sample. We examined the associations of media exposure, ANS reactivity, preattack psychopathology, and prior violence exposure with onset of PTSD symptoms related to the bombings.

RESULTS

Media exposure, preattack psychopathology, and prior violence exposure were associated with PTSD symptoms. Moreover, media exposure interacted with sympathetic reactivity to predict PTSD symptom onset, such that adolescents with lower levels of sympathetic reactivity developed PTSD symptoms only following high exposure to media coverage of the attack.

CONCLUSIONS

We provide novel evidence that physiological reactivity prior to exposure to an unpredictable traumatic stressor predicts PTSD symptom onset. These findings have implications for identifying youths most vulnerable to PTSD following wide-scale trauma.

Research Methods in Child Disaster Studies: A Review of Studies Generated by the September 11, 2001, Terrorist Attacks; the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami; and Hurricane Katrina

BACKGROUND

A comprehensive review of the design principles and methodological approaches that have been used to make inferences from the research on disasters in children is needed.

OBJECTIVE

To identify the methodological approaches used to study children's reactions to three recent major disasters-the September 11, 2001, attacks; the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami; and Hurricane Katrina.

METHODS

This review was guided by a systematic literature search.

RESULTS

A total of 165 unduplicated empirical reports were generated by the search and examined for this review. This included 83 references on September 11, 29 on the 2004 Tsunami, and 53 on Hurricane Katrina.

CONCLUSIONS

A diversity of methods has been brought to bear in understanding children's reactions to disasters. While cross-sectional studies predominate, pre-event data for some investigations emerged from archival data and data from studies examining non-disaster topics. The nature and extent of the influence of risk and protective variables beyond disaster exposure are not fully understood due, in part, to limitations in the study designs used in the extant research. Advancing an understanding of the roles of exposure and various individual, family, and social factors depends upon the extent to which measures and assessment techniques are valid and reliable, as well as on data sources and data collection designs. Comprehensive assessments that extend beyond questionnaires and checklists to include interviews and cognitive and biological measures to elucidate the negative and positive effects of disasters on children also may improve the knowledge base.

Mental health approaches to child victims of acts of terrorism

It has long been recognized that human beings exposed to severe stress may develop psychological symptoms. With recent terrorist acts around the world including the New York City World Trade Center September 11, 2001 atrocity, there has been a growing interest in the specific impact of terrorist acts on the victims and witnesses. One area that has received less study is the specific impact on children. This paper reviews some of the general effects of traumatic stress on children and the history of the research in this area including a specific discussion of post-traumatic stress disorder in children. This is followed by a review of how children might react to the trauma of a terrorist attack differentiating between three different subgroups of children (preschool age children, school-age children, and adolescents). Then there is a review of what a comprehensive evaluation of childhood victims of terrorism should entail. Finally, treatment modalities that have been shown to be effective are reviewed.