Dart Center for Journalism and Trauma

Myths of Fort Hood

By Bruce Shapiro

Journalists seeking an easy answer in PTSD threaten to obscure the real story of Army psychiatrist Nidal Malik Hasan's rampage.

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 »

Framing the Combat Stress Clinic Shooting

By Stan Alcorn

The deadliest soldier-on-soldier incident among U.S. servicemembers since the beginning of the Iraq war occurred yesterday. Sgt. John M. Russell has been charged with five counts of murder and one count of aggravated assault after opening fire upon staff at a combat stress clinic at Camp Liberty, Iraq. More »

How News is "Framed"

By Sara Tiegreen and Elana Newman

An overview of how news stories, traumatic and otherwise, are "framed," finding a general absence of context and recommending avenues for future research.

The Effect of News "Frames"

By Sara Tiegreen and Elana Newman

An overview of current scholarship regarding how different, contextual approaches to reporting news influence consumers’ knowledge, perceptions and opinions, and the implications for researchers and for journalists.