Sep 22, 2021 01:31 AM
One thing about it, is that Woke Speech Policing will subdue its own, originally well-intended offspring when that becomes necessary.
For instance, "trigger warning" became a cancelled term a few months ago in the former "Oppressive Language List" maintained by student staff at PARC. That has since been renamed The Suggested Language List.
Several other previously sanctioned, popular, or functional social justice expressions had also fallen victim to updated disapproval (including the word "victim" itself): https://www.scivillage.com/thread-10528-...l#pid44368
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The data is in — trigger warnings don’t work
https://www.chronicle.com/article/the-da...-dont-work
INTRO: The original proponents of trigger warnings on campus argued that they would empower students suffering from trauma to delve into difficult material. “The point is not to enable — let alone encourage — students to skip readings or our subsequent class discussion,” the philosopher Kate Manne wrote in The New York Times. “It’s about enabling everyone’s rational engagement.”
Now, about a decade after trigger warnings arrived on college campuses, it’s clear that an avoidance rationale is officially competing with the original lean-in logic.
A recent Inside Higher Ed piece by Michael Bugeja, an Iowa State journalism professor, is emblematic of this shift. In light of the tumultuous times (a “mental-health pandemic,” ongoing sexual violence and racism, the anxiety of returning to in-person instruction), Bugeja says that trigger warnings are needed now more than ever. All faculty members should follow his lead, he argues, and include detailed trigger warnings on their syllabi accompanied by the following note: “You don’t have to attend class if the content elicits an uncomfortable emotional response.”
Bugeja’s article prompted us to review the latest research on the efficacy of trigger warnings. We found no evidence that trigger warnings improve students’ mental health. What’s more, we are now convinced that they push students and faculty members alike to turn away from the study of vitally important topics that are seen as too “distressing.”
To clarify at the outset, a trigger warning is not the same thing as a general content advisory like the “explicit content” label for music albums or the film-rating system (G, PG, R, etc.). Trigger warnings identify specific content and themes. Here’s an example for Toni Morrison’s debut novel, The Bluest Eye:
• Alcohol abuse
• Child abuse
• Death (including infant)
• Incest
• Racism (including structured)
• Sexual assault
• Toxic parents
The origins of trigger warnings date to the 1970s, when post-traumatic stress disorder was codified as a psychiatric condition, the symptoms of which include flashbacks, nightmares, intrusive thoughts, and social withdrawal. The term “trigger” signified any stimulus that set off a post-traumatic stress reaction, from particular sights, sounds, and smells to certain foods, faces, and calendar dates.
When debates about trigger warnings first erupted, there was little-to-no research on their effectiveness. Today we have an emerging body of peer-reviewed research to consult.
The consensus, based on 17 studies using a range of media, including literature passages, photographs, and film clips: Trigger warnings do not alleviate emotional distress. They do not significantly reduce negative affect or minimize intrusive thoughts, two hallmarks of PTSD. Notably, these findings hold for individuals with and without a history of trauma. (For a review of the relevant research, see the 2020 Clinical Psychological Science article “Helping or Harming? The Effect of Trigger Warnings on Individuals With Trauma Histories” by Payton J. Jones, Benjamin W. Bellet, and Richard J. McNally.)
We are not aware of a single experimental study that has found significant benefits of using trigger warnings. Looking specifically at trauma survivors, including those with a diagnosis of PTSD, the Jones et al. study found that trigger warnings “were not helpful even when they warned about content that closely matched survivors’ traumas.”
What’s more, they found that trigger warnings actually increased the anxiety of individuals with the most severe PTSD, prompting them to “view trauma as more central to their life narrative.” “Trigger warnings,” they concluded, “may be most harmful to the very individuals they were designed to protect.” (MORE)
For instance, "trigger warning" became a cancelled term a few months ago in the former "Oppressive Language List" maintained by student staff at PARC. That has since been renamed The Suggested Language List.
Several other previously sanctioned, popular, or functional social justice expressions had also fallen victim to updated disapproval (including the word "victim" itself): https://www.scivillage.com/thread-10528-...l#pid44368
- - - - - -
The data is in — trigger warnings don’t work
https://www.chronicle.com/article/the-da...-dont-work
INTRO: The original proponents of trigger warnings on campus argued that they would empower students suffering from trauma to delve into difficult material. “The point is not to enable — let alone encourage — students to skip readings or our subsequent class discussion,” the philosopher Kate Manne wrote in The New York Times. “It’s about enabling everyone’s rational engagement.”
Now, about a decade after trigger warnings arrived on college campuses, it’s clear that an avoidance rationale is officially competing with the original lean-in logic.
A recent Inside Higher Ed piece by Michael Bugeja, an Iowa State journalism professor, is emblematic of this shift. In light of the tumultuous times (a “mental-health pandemic,” ongoing sexual violence and racism, the anxiety of returning to in-person instruction), Bugeja says that trigger warnings are needed now more than ever. All faculty members should follow his lead, he argues, and include detailed trigger warnings on their syllabi accompanied by the following note: “You don’t have to attend class if the content elicits an uncomfortable emotional response.”
Bugeja’s article prompted us to review the latest research on the efficacy of trigger warnings. We found no evidence that trigger warnings improve students’ mental health. What’s more, we are now convinced that they push students and faculty members alike to turn away from the study of vitally important topics that are seen as too “distressing.”
To clarify at the outset, a trigger warning is not the same thing as a general content advisory like the “explicit content” label for music albums or the film-rating system (G, PG, R, etc.). Trigger warnings identify specific content and themes. Here’s an example for Toni Morrison’s debut novel, The Bluest Eye:
• Alcohol abuse
• Child abuse
• Death (including infant)
• Incest
• Racism (including structured)
• Sexual assault
• Toxic parents
The origins of trigger warnings date to the 1970s, when post-traumatic stress disorder was codified as a psychiatric condition, the symptoms of which include flashbacks, nightmares, intrusive thoughts, and social withdrawal. The term “trigger” signified any stimulus that set off a post-traumatic stress reaction, from particular sights, sounds, and smells to certain foods, faces, and calendar dates.
When debates about trigger warnings first erupted, there was little-to-no research on their effectiveness. Today we have an emerging body of peer-reviewed research to consult.
The consensus, based on 17 studies using a range of media, including literature passages, photographs, and film clips: Trigger warnings do not alleviate emotional distress. They do not significantly reduce negative affect or minimize intrusive thoughts, two hallmarks of PTSD. Notably, these findings hold for individuals with and without a history of trauma. (For a review of the relevant research, see the 2020 Clinical Psychological Science article “Helping or Harming? The Effect of Trigger Warnings on Individuals With Trauma Histories” by Payton J. Jones, Benjamin W. Bellet, and Richard J. McNally.)
We are not aware of a single experimental study that has found significant benefits of using trigger warnings. Looking specifically at trauma survivors, including those with a diagnosis of PTSD, the Jones et al. study found that trigger warnings “were not helpful even when they warned about content that closely matched survivors’ traumas.”
What’s more, they found that trigger warnings actually increased the anxiety of individuals with the most severe PTSD, prompting them to “view trauma as more central to their life narrative.” “Trigger warnings,” they concluded, “may be most harmful to the very individuals they were designed to protect.” (MORE)