Dart Center for Journalism and Trauma

Word Choice Crucial When Reporting Sexual Violence

By Summer Nelson

When media reports sensationalize sexual violence or attribute violent crimes to “lovers’ quarrels,” neither victims nor society are well-served. Researchers at an American Psychological Association annual meeting explored why.

Nieman Reports on Trauma Journalism

By Stan Alcorn

"We're all meaning-hungry creatures. We're permanent citizens of the republic of trauma." Those words were spoken by Pete Hamill, among 110 news professionals, artists, researchers and scholars who gathered in February 2009 at the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University to explore how traumatic events challenge journalists' storytelling. More »

How Clinicians Can Help Journalists Cover Disaster

By Stan Alcorn

"If I asked you to fill in the following statement, 'Journalists are __,' what's the first thing that pops into your head?" Elana Newman, research director of the Dart Center, posed this question Monday as part of a webinar she co-hosted with Dart Center Executive Director Bruce Shapiro. In a disaster, when interviewing and reporting on victims is inevitable, the gap between a clinician's answer and a journalist's answer to this question can be the difference between stories that are both sensitive and effective and stories that are neither. More »

Audio: Conflict Journalism and Surviving Kidnap

By Stan Alcorn

Last month in Bonn, Germany, news media, intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations, politicians, artists, entrepreneurs and scientists from all over the world came together to discuss conflict in a multimedia age. The Dart Center organized panels on "The Trauma Factor: The Missing Ingredient in Conflict Journalism" and "Surviving Kidnap"; You now can download or listen online to the audio. More »

Two Deaths, Two Contexts

By Stan Alcorn

In Baghdad, Chancellor Keesling, a 25-year-old soldier from Indianapolis, shot and killed himself. In Tehran, Neda Agha Soltan, a 26-year-old student, was shot and killed as she watched a peaceful protest.

Two very different deaths, two very different news stories, but both required context to express or arouse anything but pain and loss. More »

Study: Photographers and Trauma

A survey of photojournalists showed that the vast majority have been exposed to traumatic events, and that about six percent report symptoms consistent with post-traumatic stress disorder, according to a recently published study by Dart Center researchers.

Symposium: Representations of Violence and Disaster in News Media

In San Diego, at the American Psychological Association's Annual Convention, a symposium of scholars on psychological, methodological, and theoretical approaches examining current research in journalism and trauma.

Report on Ground Zero

By Mike Cane

Elana Newman, Ph.D., a University of Tulsa associate professor of psychology, and Barbara Monseu, a Denver investment consultant who as a school district official had coordinated responses to students, families and staff following the April 1999 Columbine High School shooting, went to New York City for the Dart Center in December 2002. For more than six months they directed Dart Center Ground Zero (DCGZ). Their goal: To link journalists affected by the attacks to emotional, technical and physical support resources.These three articles review the achievements of that project, which was funded by a grant from the Dart Foundation. They are drawn from the project report, written by Monseu and Newman, and from interviews with Newman.