A qualitative analysis of satisfaction with justice and desire for revenge in survivors of the September 11, 2001, attacks on New York City’s World Trade Center.

Abstract

Background: Most of the existing research on the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 (9/11) has narrowly focused on posttraumatic stress disorder, limiting the potential to learn about other important consequences of this disaster. This qualitative study examined survivors' views of justice regarding the 9/11 attacks on New York City's World Trade Center. Method: A volunteer sample of 196 employees with varied 9/11 disaster-trauma exposures from 8 affected agencies in the New York City area was recruited approximately 35 months after the incident. The participants completed structured interviews about their disaster experiences and wrote brief essays describing what justice meant to them in relation to their experience of the 9/11 attacks. The qualitative analysis first identified 4 themes regarding justice and revenge in the text of the essays, and the content of the essays was then coded into these 4 themes, yielding final definitions of the content in them. Results: The accountability-for-perpetrators theme was coded in more essays than any other themes. The essays had little discussion of revenge relative to the amount of discussion on justice. PTS was not mentioned in any of the essays. Conclusion: These findings suggest the importance of broadening the focus of future studies examining justice in relation to disaster.Editor's Note. Continue the conversation by submitting your comments and questions about this article/book review to PeacePsychology.org/ peaceconflict. (The editor of PeacePsychology.org reserves the right to exclude material that fails to contribute to constructive discussion.) This article was published Online First December 13, 2018. MEAGAN WHITNEY holds a M.D. She is a third year psychiatry resident at the

A mixed methods study of satisfaction with justice and desire for revenge in survivors of the September 11, 2001, attacks on New York City's World Trade Center

“…The qualitative data were collected from respondents in this study through open‐ended essays providing fresh perspectives on revenge and justice, without specific constraints. The themes arising from the content of these essays aligned with the same four categories assessed by the quantitative instrument, without emergence of additional themes (Whitney et al, ), despite the collection of the qualitative data independent of the quantitative data collection. The convergence of the quantitative categories with the qualitative themes was quite remarkable considering the methodological differences between deductive quantitative approaches, where categories are created a priori and then the constructs are validated, and inductive qualitative approaches, where themes emerge from the data and face validity is established.…”

“…Although this literature has provided valuable insight as well, it also has been shown to be limited to the collection of information of interest to researchers. Qualitative research by members of this team has led to a similar conclusion to that reached in the qualitative 9/11 research (North et al, 2015)-that quantitative research on justice and revenge does not necessarily capture the breadth and depth of this experience (Whitney et al, 2018).…”

“…Two hundred fifty‐four participants completed a self‐report questionnaire that included a section devoted to perception of justice and revenge, which was completed by 196 (77%). Characteristics of the study sample ( N = 196) have been previously provided in detail (Whitney et al, ): The sample was about half (54%) female with a median age 44 years and about two thirds (68%) white. About one half (47%) were currently married, and about two thirds (67%) had a college degree.…”

“…The open‐ended justice essays were reviewed for recurring themes, and four themes were established based conceptually on material represented in three quantitative satisfaction with justice scales (accountability for perpetrators, needs of victims, and justice through ensuring future safety) and a quantitative desire for revenge scale previously established by Sonis et al () and further developed by this research team (Whitney et al, ). Interrater reliability was established by two independent raters on these themes achieving Cohen's κ coefficients or Yule's Y coefficient of colligation (Spitznagel & Helzer, ) of at least 0.8 (0.88 for accountability, Yule's Y = 0.85 for needs of victims, and Yule's Y = 0.82 for safety), indicating excellent reliability (Fleiss, ).…”

“…Two raters then coded text from the essays into these themes using ATLAS.ti (ATLAS.ti Scientific Software Development GmbH, Berlin, Germany) software. Detailed findings from the qualitative analysis have been presented in a previous article (Whitney et al, ).…”