By Kathleen Kingsbury
TIME
Copyright 2008 TIME, Inc.
IRVINE, Calif. — Talk it out. That’s the first advice most victims are given in the wake of trauma. Conventional wisdom would suggest that burying one’s emotions after a violent incident — such as a school shooting or terrorist bombing — will only lead to deeper anxiety later on. Yet, while mental health practitioners widely subscribe to this truism, it has rarely been tested outside a laboratory setting — past studies have found a lack of convincing evidence to support the use of psychological debriefing to mitigate trauma — and some experts think the theory doesn’t hold up in every situation.
Researchers at the University at Buffalo and University of California, Irvine, explored the question by compiling survey data from a random sample of 2,000 Americans after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. What they discovered surprised them — participants who chose not to discuss their feelings right after the attacks often fared better over the subsequent two years than those who did. “We constantly tell people it’s wrong to hold feelings inside,” says lead author Mark Seery, a psychology professor at Buffalo. “But our findings [suggest] the exact opposite.”
Using an online survey, Seery and his colleagues gave Americans the opportunity to write about their thoughts on the 9/11 terrorist attacks, both on that day and for a few days afterward. Of some 2,000 people surveyed, about three-quarters choose to articulate their emotional response to the events. Older participants agreed more readily than younger ones, and people who had experienced relatively more trauma in their lives tended to write longer reactions. The researchers then followed both groups, evaluating their mental and physical well-being on several occasions over the next two years. A clear pattern soon emerged: compared with those who stayed mum, people who openly responded after 9/11 tended to report more symptoms of post-traumatic stress and general stress, as well as more physician-diagnosed ailments. Indeed, the more in-depth the participant’s initial response, the worse off he or she was physically and mentally in the following years. The study, which was funded by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute of Mental Health, will be published in this month’s Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology.
Full Story: Findings suggest trauma victims shouldn’t be pressured into therapy