ABSTRACT

A trigger warning is an alert that upcoming material containing distressing themes might “trigger” the details and emotion associated with a negative memory to come to mind. Warnings supposedly prevent or minimise this distress. But, do warnings really have this effect? To simulate the experience described above, here, we examined whether warning participants—by telling them that recalling a negative event would be distressing—would change characteristics associated with the immediate and delayed recall of a negative event (such as phenomenology e.g., vividness, sense of reliving), compared to participants who we did not warn. Generally, we found that time helps to heal the “emotional wounds” associated with negative memories: negative characteristics—such as emotion, vividness etc.—faded over time. However, the event’s emotional impact (the frequency of experiences related to the event such as “I had trouble staying asleep”), subsided less over a two-week delay for participants who were warned in the first session. Our findings suggest that warning messages may prolong the negative characteristics associated with memories over time, rather than prepare people to recall a negative experience.

摘要

触发警告是一种警告，即将到来的包含令人痛苦主题的材料可能会“触发”与负面记忆相关的细节和情绪想到。据推测，警告可以防止或最大限度地减少这种痛苦。但是，警告真的有这种效果吗？为了模拟上述体验，我们在这里检查了警告参与者（通过告诉他们回忆负面事件会令人痛苦）是否会改变与负面事件的即时和延迟回忆相关的特征（例如现象学，例如生动性、感官重温），与我们没有警告的参与者相比。一般来说，我们发现时间有助于治愈与负面记忆相关的“情感创伤”：负面特征——如情绪、生动性等——会随着时间的推移而消失。然而，事件的情绪影响（与事件相关的体验频率，例如“我难以入睡”），对于在第一次会议中被警告的参与者来说，在两周的延迟后消退较少。我们的研究结果表明，警告信息可能会随着时间的推移延长与记忆相关的负面特征，而不是让人们准备好回忆负面经历。