Talking about traumatic events: A cross-cultural investigation

Abstract

Individuals are facing traumatic situations like natural crises (like floods, earthquakes) and man-made disasters (terroristic attacks) incrementally. Traumatic events are related to psychological consequences for survivors (depression, posttraumatic stress disorder). The experience of a traumatic event can be disclosed through narratives, which can be linguistically analyzed with the Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC). In this study, cultural and temporal differences in narratives about different traumatic events in seven European countries are investigated. 132 survivors, who experienced a traumatic situation, reported their experiences in focus groups and interviews. The transcripts of narratives were analyzed with the LIWC2007 (Pennebaker, Chung, Ireland, Gonzales & Booth, 2007). Regarding the LIWC categories affective and cognitive processes, event characteristics as well as cultural and temporal differences were explored. Results show that traumatic situations are reported with a greater amount of negative emotion words. Cultural differences regarding the LIWC categories are found between the seven European countries. A temporal factor, considering days elapsed between an event and narrative, was investigated. Temporal differences in cognitive word use, but not for affective contents, were recognized. This study was able to show tendencies of cultural diversity in the expression of traumatic events in survivors of seven European countries as well as to explore a temporal factor, which is related to a retrospective way of narration.

Post- and peritraumatic stress in disaster survivors: an explorative study about the influence of individual and event characteristics across different types of disasters

“…This was not entirely explained by symptoms of PTSD or exposure to terror attacks, instead indicating cultural differences. Although we did not find any influence of culture on perceived post- and peritraumatic stress levels, tendencies for cross-cultural differences in talking about the traumatic event in this sample have been reported elsewhere (Freitag et al, 2010 ), and thus evidence would suggest that culture should remain a consideration in this field of research. For future studies with larger, more heterogeneous samples it might be worth operationalizing the variable culture not as country of residence but as a function of other cultural aspects such as race (Norris, Perilla, Ibanez, & Murphy, 2001 ); many countries in Western Europe are common in this respect and this might also explain our non-significant findings for culture.…”

“…The predictors include: Socio-demographic and individual factors, such as female gender (Schlenger et al, 2002 ), low socio-economic status (Kumar et al, 2007 ), age (Telles, Sing, & Joshi, 2009 ), migrant background (Rivière et al, 2008 ; Rubin, Brewin, Greenberg, Simpson, & Wessely, 2005 ) and a psychiatric diagnosis of the survivor before the event (Neria et al, 2006 ). Also, culture is believed to have an influence, on emotional and cognitive processing both during and after the disaster (Freitag, Grimm, & Schmidt, 2010 ; Steger, Frazier, & Zacchanini, 2008 ). Considering peritraumatic emotional and cognitive factors, (life) threat, loss of control, and fear have all been reported to be related to posttraumatic stress in cases of natural disasters such as the 2004 Tsunami and the 1999 Marmara earthquake, or in terror attacks such as those on the World Trade Center in 2001 (Basoglu, Kihk, Salcioglu, & Livanou, 2004 ; Basoglu, Salcioglu, & Livanou, 2002 ; Hollifield, Hewage, Gunawardena, Kodituwakku, & Weerarathnege, 2008 ; Simeon, Greenberg, Knutelska, Schmeidler, & Hollander, 2003 ).…”

Poor Sleep Quality and Its Relationship with Individual Characteristics, Personal Experiences and Mental Health during the COVID-19 Pandemic

“…While education itself was not a factor associated with likelihood of response, cross-cultural differences in the use of language may have an impact on the results. Cross-cultural studies comparing interview transcripts from Czech Republic, Poland, Turkey and Germany (translated to English) in differences of language about traumatic events suggests some differences in the use of LIWC categories such as cognition, but not affective processes that were used in this study [ 68 ]. Across cultures, differences in pronoun-use, use of perceptual and social language exist [ 69 ].…”

An Exploration of Reported Cognitions During an Earthquake and Its Aftershocks

“…In addition, our theme of confusion and shock or overwhelmed was reflective of shock and disorientation by Wilson et al (2012) and cognitive avoidance by Grey et al (Grey and Holmes, 2008;Holmes et al, 2005), all indicative of a sense of being stunned or possible derealization. Of note, although the theme of excitement was low in reported frequency, positive emotion-related words have been found in other trauma research populations (Freitag et al, 2011). Further, there seemed to be some overlap between Grey's control and reasoning with both our safetyseeking and self-soothing themes, that is, in some way, cognitions engaging the individual toward taking or planning physical action or using internal reasoning to reduce potential distress.…”

“…The three most common themes in both studies were control and reasoning, general threat of injury and death, and uncertain threat. Grimm et al examined peritraumatic cognitive content and processes associated with narratives after both natural and manmade disasters (e.g., earthquake, terror attack, bus accident, building collapse; Freitag et al, 2011;Grimm et al, 2012aGrimm et al, , 2012b. Grimm et al examined peritraumatic cognitive content and processes associated with narratives after both natural and manmade disasters (e.g., earthquake, terror attack, bus accident, building collapse; Freitag et al, 2011;Grimm et al, 2012aGrimm et al, , 2012b.…”