SGER: Predicting Affective Reactions to Collective Loss

Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff AZ

Investigators

Abstract

Although a great deal is known about how individuals react to personal bereavement, less is known about how individuals respond to collective loss. The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 were of such a magnitude as to significantly affect millions of people living in the United States, irrespective of whether they knew anyone personally who died or who narrowly escaped death. The purpose of this small grant for exploratory research is to examine the extent to which collective loss reactions may be similar to well-documented reactions to personal bereavement, such as grief and depression, or to survivor reactions, such as survivor guilt and anxiety. The project examines the levels and kinds of affective reactions experienced in the immediate aftermath of the attacks as well as personality and background variables that may be uniquely associated with these different reactions. Given the on-going nature of terrorist threat and the need to understand how reactions to traumatic events may unfold over time, college students will complete questionnaires at 3-6 weeks after the September 11 attacks and again six months later. Results from the study will expand theoretical understanding of how individuals, even those thousands of miles away from the actual event, react to collective loss. In turn, this understanding may aid intervention efforts directed at coping with such loss.