A trauma trigger is an experience that causes someone to recall a previous traumatic memory, although the trigger itself need not be frightening or traumatic and can be indirectly or superficially reminiscent of an earlier traumatic incident. Trauma triggers are related to posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a condition in which people often cannot control the recurrence of emotional or physical symptoms, or of repressed memory. Triggers can be subtle and difficult to anticipate, and can sometimes exacerbate PTSD. A trauma trigger may also be referred to as a trauma stimulus or a trauma stressor.
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Visual media
It has been suggested that the realistic portrayal of graphic violence in visual media may cause sufferers to encounter lifelike trauma triggers while watching movies or television.
Trigger warnings
Trigger warnings are warnings that a work contains writing, images, or concepts which could act as a trauma trigger. The term and concept originated on the Internet and then spread to other areas, such as print media and university courses.
In an interview about trigger warnings for The Daily Telegraph, Professor Metin Basoglu, a psychologist internationally recognised for his trauma research, said that "instead of encouraging a culture of avoidance, [the media] should be encouraging exposure. Most trauma victims avoid situations that remind them of the experience. Avoidance means helplessness and helplessness means depression. That's not good." Richard J. McNally, a Professor of Psychology at Harvard University, wrote in the Pacific Standard that "trigger warnings are designed to help victims avoid reminders of their trauma, thereby preventing emotional discomfort. Yet avoidance reinforces PTSD. Conversely, systematic exposure to triggers and the memories they provoke is the most effective means of overcoming the disorder." McNally's article cites several academic studies of PTSD sufferers in support of these claims.
Now that trigger warnings have appeared in other media, Jay Caspian Kang, best known for his sports writing at Grantland, accused these warnings of "reducing a work of literature to its ugliest plot points".
In higher education
Students at UC Santa Barbara passed a resolution in support of mandatory trigger warnings for classes that could contain potentially upsetting material. Professors would be required to alert students of such material and allow them to skip classes that could make them feel uncomfortable. A professor at Texas A&M University argues "the purpose of trigger warnings is not to cause students to avoid traumatic content, but to prepare them for it, and in extreme circumstances to provide alternate modes of learning."
The American Association of University Professors has issued a report critical of trigger warnings in university contexts, stating that "The presumption that students need to be protected rather than challenged in a classroom is at once infantilizing and anti-intellectual." Angus Johnston, a history professor at the City University of New York, said that trigger warnings can be a part of "sound pedagogy", noting that students encountering potentially triggering material are "coming to it as whole people with a wide range of experiences, and that the journey we're going on together may at times be painful. It's not coddling them to acknowledge that. In fact, it's just the opposite."