> Consider a meta-analysis of 39 studies in 2007 by Sam Houston State University in Texas that found a ‘clear, consistent association’ between using avoidance-based coping strategies (that is, staying away from upsetting stressors or avoiding thinking about them) and increased psychological distress.
... BUT the operative word is "associated" not "caused"
Also from the article:
> critics argue that the avoidance of potentially upsetting material is actually a counterproductive approach because it offers no chance to learn to manage one’s emotional reactions.
This is wrong. You don't learn to manage emotional reactions by being forced to consume triggering content. If you have a problem with emotional reactions that needs adjustment, that's what therapy is for. Or using delaying tactics such that you don't consume the content until you're more prepared to handle it. Anyone who thinks springing triggering content on people without warning is good because it forces them to react to it is literally abusive.
And many times avoiding triggering content forever is perfectly fine and doesn't need to be managed. Personally, I don't have any trauma around rape but I would really prefer to avoid reading about it, so I really appreciate trigger warnings on content that includes it. This isn't something that needs to be "fixed", there's no reason why I must work towards being indifferent towards rape.
There may be certain contexts in which training is an acceptable thing for a person to do or have done to them, but that typically doesn't apply to normal interactions between adult human beings.
I believe their implication was that we can and should be training ourselves, which is something we already do every day.
Your average lecturer or teacher is not trained in this way, at least specifically regarding trauma.
Just about 10 years ago cutting edge therapists were implanting false memories of childhood trauma.. If someone does not seem to need a therapist based on actual behavior then I don't think schools should be inviting lecturers to create pre-screening based on students reactions to trigger warnings, etc.
Bad ideas like every lecturer learning pop psychology "safety" and then reading tea leaves to tell people under their authority to get help is how you create a generation with psychological problems.
Its not like trigger warnings impose an onerous responsibility on teachers. There isn't any suggestion that they tell their students to get help. Its literally just a "heads up, I'm about to talk about X".
I'm not on a campus, and when I was in was in physics and math classrooms, but its hard to imagine this is that big of a deal.
As I see it this is basically recreating the weaker sex etiquette argument with bias based on experiences instead of gender. All the outrage.of speaking in front of the wrong people, special new requirements, plenty of signalling that you are better than others because they manage the necessary risks to do their job.
The only time lecturers wouldn't know when something might trigger someone is if they haven't actually read or looked at the content that they're about to present, which I find pretty hard to believe.
With the trigger warning what exactly? It's easy to announce something you are going to do and do it. The article addresses how pointless and possibly counterproductive that is.
With a trigger warning you simply don't consume the content. Ideally, this is posted on the syllabus, so that the amount of time wasted arguing about this is minimized.
The article doesn't really "address" anything, it just makes value statements. For example, this paragraph:
> Consider a meta-analysis of 39 studies in 2007 by Sam Houston State University in Texas that found a ‘clear, consistent association’ between using avoidance-based coping strategies (that is, staying away from upsetting stressors or avoiding thinking about them) and increased psychological distress. For a more concrete example, look at the findings from a study, published in 2011, of women who witnessed the Virginia Tech shooting of 2007 – those who tried to avoid thinking about what happened tended to experience more symptoms of depression and anxiety in the months that followed.
You could say that the association is that people who avoid their traumas are more depressed and anxious, but you could also say the reverse, that people who are more depressed or anxious try to avoid the traumas that caused those things in the first place. It's an association with no causal link, so you don't know which direction the association runs in or even if one is directly caused by the other.
Trigger warnings are an avoidance mechanism, period. The only difference between this and a peanut allergy is that people don't feel the need to moralize about how we're enabling peanut-avoiders like it's a bad thing.
Er, no. Most people are doing a rough calculation of frequency of real allergy to self diagnosis and quack practitioners.. Substitute another food like wheat and you get a different result. Then people start asking why perception of allergies is spreading when actual prevalence is unchanged and you get back to the proven science understanding of psychology, placebo.
https://www.quackwatch.org/01QuackeryRelatedTopics/Tests/all...
That should be done safely and consensually within the context of a therapy session/plan with a professional guiding it.
It's like surgery. Entirely acceptable in certain scenarios, but you'd object if your English lit prof decided to DIY it during class.
I know an abuse survivor who has been in therapy for many years working on the impact of it. We avoid movies with abuse depictions as it causes severe disassociation and setbacks in that treatment.
Someone for whom it’s triggering but less severely so might just opt to watch said movies with a trusted friend on a day they’re feeling emotionally sound.
They allow folks to choose the level of exposure to optional, potentially damaging things. Just like an R rating on a film might make you pause before bringing an 8 year old to the theater.
This is fine as long as it's kept within reason like certain more commonly occurring traumatic themes such as sexual violence, etc. Conversely, it's also possible to go too far and let this get out of hand. If, for example, we were to let everyone define whatever they feel may personally trigger or offend them, we could end up with half of everything needing various warnings for each one-in-ten-thousand person's particular sensitivity. That could grow unmanageable pretty quickly and become an unreasonable burden on publishers, performers, teachers, comedians, etc.
I feel there needs to be a healthy balance between the responsibilities we expect speaker/publisher to bear and the responsibility each individual must bear. It's reasonable to expect individuals choosing to participate in the public sphere possess a modicum of resilience. Otherwise, we risk diminishing the diversity of our robust marketplace of ideas.
And while "springing" "triggering" "content" on a weak person is a bad idea, encouraging them to seek out triggering content on their own and approach it at their own pace is going to create a stronger, better person. It's not just about the trigger either - learning that you can overcome something like that is extremely empowering. Hiding for the rest of your life is slowly going to turn you into a coward.
That wasn't the point being made.
The point is that if depictions of rape are triggering to you, it's not necessarily important to work on not being triggered by rape depictions. Avoidance is generally acceptable there.
Wouldn't you wish, if a friend of yours was chronically vunerable in a way that hindered them that, all else being equal, they would become more resilient- for their own sake?
Being triggerable is a weakness. It gives others power over you. So why would anyone want that?
Also, not being triggerable does not mean being insensitive or cynical or tolerant or whatever. It's just about being able to deal with stuff without freaking out.
Even after decades of therapy, rape victims may still be triggered by descriptions/depictions of rape. Abuse victims may not be able to watch a movie with an abused child without breaking down, even after long, intensive therapy.
It's not generally a choice.
And upon reflection, I get that I'm triggered by dogs. Having been attacked by a doberman, many years ago. And surviving only because it was on a chain, and I didn't fall down. So it only took a chunk out of one ankle.
So now, whenever I encounter a dog, I immediately think about what I could use as a weapon.
Triggering people in an unsafe, uncontrolled context can make it harder, not easier.
Are you a therapist?
Are you their therapist?
Heck, I don't have PTSD but I don't particularly like seeing sexual violence in movies or television shows and more than once I wish I had been warned about it ahead of time.
From my point of view, trigger warnings are courteous. Its not my job to tell people how to live their lives. If someone asks me in good faith to let them know before I talk about something that might disturb them, I take that seriously because I'm not a jerk.
The idea that trigger warnings constitute some kind of creeping Orwellian thing is nuts to me. The whole point of them is "I'm going to say this!"
try not to be one.
Related to that, a lot of people prefer watching certain genres such as action, romance, sports, sci-fi, comedy, etc... If it's ok to inform people they're about to watch an Adam Sandler romcom then I don't see what's so bad about informing people they're about to encounter triggering content.
We're not comparing "coping mechanisms of avoidance" vs "coping mechanisms that allow you to face the stressor". We're comparing "coping mechanisms of avoidance" vs "being exposed to a stressor with no warning and no way to avoid it, regardless of if you do or dont have a coping mechanism in place at all".