Compassion Fatigue: Communication and Burnout toward Social Problems

Abstract

This study establishes the construct of “compassion fatigue,” encompassing desensitization and emotional burnout, as a phenomenon associated with pervasive communication about social problems. The study marks the first-known empirical investigation of compassion fatigue as it relates to media coverage and interpersonal communication about social problems. A telephone survey methodology was used to measure compassion fatigue among a general, adult population toward four social problems: AIDS, homelessness, violent crime, and child abuse. Results indicate the existence of a compassion fatigue phenomenon, in varying degrees of magnitude, for every issue. Compassion fatigue was found to be a situational variable, rather than a personality trait. Cognitive, affective, and behavioral manifestations of compassion fatigue are identified, and significant predictors of compassion fatigue are discussed. The findings support the existence of a mass-mediated compassion fatigue phenomenon and suggest that the nature of contemporary media coverage may contribute to emotional fatigue with society's problems.

Shooting Straight: Graphic versus Non-Graphic War Photographs

“…A lack of emotion in response to the graphic war photographs could be from issue fatigue as well as compassion fatigue after ten years of war (Kinnick, Krugman, Cameron, 1996;Silcock, et al, 2008). It makes sense that while the public has seen many horrific images, especially from the wars in the Middle East in the last decade, audience emotions in response to certain war conflicts may have been dulled, while the ability to still care about the pain of others remains intact.…”

Immersive Journalism: Immersive Virtual Reality for the First-Person Experience of News

“…The overwhelming amount of audio-visual information available on media outlets today has led to the concern that the audience becomes indifferent to topics involving human suffering (Kinnick, Krugman, & Cameron, 1996;O'Neill & Nicholson-Cole, 2009). An important role of immersive journalism could be to reinstitute the audience's emotional involvement in current events.…”

“Witnessing” or “Mediating” Distant Suffering? Ethical Questions across Moments of Text, Production, and Reception

“…In their insight that audiences have classed moral judgments about media genres and practices, we can explore how audiences also express 'lay moralities' about media practice-evaluative statements of 'good' and 'bad' in relation to media conventions of representing suffering as well as their general expectations toward journalists, producers, and audiences like them. Indeed, one issue that is unresolved in the distant suffering literature is whether audience decisions to 'seek information' or 'look away' are primarily issue-driven (Kinnick et al 1996), or prompted by judgments about how media represent these issues (Cohen 2001;Moeller 1999), or a general distrust toward media and other social institutions in. This idea that audience responses to suffering may be informed by knowledge and judgment about the media themselves links with the next section on Ecological Ethics, a third category of media ethics that we should consider alongside Textual Ethics and Audience Ethics.…”

“…While it is recognized that there is 'no decent way to sort through the multiple claims on our time or philanthropy' in the face of the world's atrocities (Midgeley 1998: 45-46), scholars nevertheless positively value audience activities of information-seeking (Kinnick et al 1996), empathizing and analyzing (Donnar 2009), donating money (Tester 2001), or even the mere act of viewing rather than turning away (Cohen 2001;Seu 2003). Luc Boltanski rescues the value of speech and protest as legitimate actions toward media narratives of suffering, contrary to perceptions that talk 'costs nothing' or have no consequence.…”

“…However, compassion fatigue is operationalized and measured in different ways. There are those who empirically study patterns of avoidance towards televised suffering (Kinnick et al 1996); some research rhetorical responses of apathy or pity toward specific texts of suffering (Höijer 2004); while others theorize about both (Cohen 2001;Seu 2003). …”