RAPID: Threat Perception on the First Anniversary of the Boston Marathon Bombings

2013年4月15日，两枚炸弹在波士顿马拉松比赛终点线附近爆炸，造成3人死亡，250多人受伤。这场悲剧给生活在波士顿大都市区的许多人带来了压力，甚至那些没有参加波士顿马拉松比赛的人也是如此。社会心理学研究可以帮助我们理解经历这种类型的事件会如何影响我们；例如，这些经历是否会影响我们对社会环境的感知和反应？在经历了这种事件后，我们是否认为世界变得更具威胁性？PI和他的同事之前进行的研究表明，在波士顿马拉松爆炸案发生后的几周里，人们在模糊的情况下看到威胁的倾向发生了变化。目前的研究将利用波士顿马拉松爆炸案一周年的背景来进一步研究这个问题；具体地说，PI将纵向研究围绕周年纪念的媒体报道如何改变对最初事件的低暴露和高暴露的人对潜在威胁的看法。参与者将包括最初活动时在波士顿生活或工作的人(高暴露组)和最初活动时不在该地区生活的人(低暴露组)。这项研究将分3波进行：周年纪念日前2个月(第1波)、周年纪念日1个月内(第2波)和周年纪念后2个月(第3波)。在每一波中，参与者将被评估对爆炸事件的媒体报道的暴露程度，他们将完成一项威胁感知任务。在这项任务中，参与者观看一个人在短时间间隔内拿着背景场景中的物体。参与者必须迅速确定他们看到的人是有威胁性的(例如，拿着枪)还是没有威胁性的(例如，拿着汽水罐或钱包)。研究人员假设，那些有更多初始事件曝光和更多接触爆炸周年媒体报道的人将显示出将非威胁误认为威胁的倾向，并降低了区分威胁和非威胁的敏感度。这项研究将首次考察对现实世界大规模暴力的新闻报道对威胁感知随时间变化的影响。这项研究将通过媒体的高度报道展示恐怖主义事件周年纪念日前后威胁感知的变化，从而产生现实世界的应用影响。对于那些每天都需要感知威胁的工作人员(例如，警察或军事人员)来说，在看到威胁时的变化，例如看到一个人拿着钱包时拿着枪，可能会对现实世界产生严重影响。这项工作还可能揭示媒体高度唤起人们对恐怖主义事件周年纪念的报道在现实世界中的潜在有害后果，特别是对易受伤害的个人(如事件曝光率较高的人)。这里使用的个体差异方法还将帮助我们在媒体关注以前的恐怖主义事件的背景下，确定哪些人的威胁感知发生变化的风险最高。

On April 15, 2013, two bombs exploded near the finish line of the Boston Marathon, killing 3 and injuring more than 250. This tragedy was stressful for many of those living in the Boston metropolitan area, even those not attending the Boston Marathon. Social psychological research can help us understand how experiencing this type of event can affect us; for example, do these experiences influence how we perceive and respond to our social environment? Do we see the world as more threatening after experiencing this type of event? Previous research conducted by the PI and colleagues demonstrate that in the weeks after the Boston Marathon bombing, people had an altered tendency to see threats in ambiguous situations. The current research will use the context of the first anniversary of the Boston Marathon bombing to further examine this question; specifically, the PIs will longitudinally examine how media coverage surrounding the anniversary can change how people with low and high exposure to the initial event perceive potential threats. Participants will include people living or working in Boston at the time of the original event (high exposure group) and people not living in the area at the time of the original event (low exposure group). The study will be conducted at 3 waves: 2 months before the anniversary (Wave 1), within 1 month of the anniversary (Wave 2), and 2 months after (Wave 3) the anniversary. At each wave, participants' exposure to media coverage of the bombing will be assessed, and they will complete a threat perception task. In this task, participants view a person holding an object against a background scene for short intervals. Participants must quickly decide whether the person they see is threatening (e.g., holding a gun) or non-threatening (e.g., holding a soda can or wallet). The researchers hypothesize that those with more initial event exposure and those with more exposure to media coverage of the anniversary of the bombing will show a tendency to misidentify non-threats as threats, and decreased sensitivity to distinguishing threats from non-threats. This study will be the first to examine the effect of news coverage of real-world mass violence on changes in threat perception over time. This research will have real-world applied impacts by showing how threat perception changes before and after a terrorism event anniversary with heightened media coverage. Alterations in seeing threats, such as "seeing" a person holding a gun when they are holding a wallet, can have serious real-world implications for those working in jobs that require threat perception every day (e.g., police officers or military personnel). This work also could reveal potential detrimental real-world consequences of highly evocative media reporting of the anniversary of a terrorism event, particularly for vulnerable individuals (such as those with higher event exposure). The individual differences approach used here also will help us to identify those at highest risk for altered threat perception in the context of media attention to a prior terrorism event.