Citation

Pfefferbaum B, North CS, Pfefferbaum RL, Jeon-Slaughter H, Houston JB, Regens JL. Int. J. Emerg. Ment. Health 2012; 14(4): 247-255.

Affiliation

Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, College of Medicine, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, USA. bettypfefferbaum@ouhsc.edu

Copyright

(Copyright © 2012, Chevron Publishing)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

23980489

Abstract

The objective of this study was to examine terrorism media coverage and psychiatric outcomes in directly-exposed terrorism survivors. The study used (1) self-report questionnaires to retrospectively assess event-related media behaviors and reactions in a cross sectional design and (2) longitudinal structured diagnostic interviews to assess psychopathologic outcomes. The participants were 99 directly-exposed Oklahoma City bombing survivors who were initially studied six months after the 1995 incident. Though a fear reaction to bombing-related television coverage and fear-driven discontinuation of bombing-related media contact were associated with diagnostic outcomes, the number of hours viewing bombing-related television coverage in the first week after the event was not associated with the prevalence of bombing-related posttraumatic stress disorder or post-bombing major depressive disorder during the seven years post event. The results raise doubt about the effects of quantified incident-related television viewing on clinically-significant emotional outcomes in directly-exposed terrorism survivors.

Language: en