Conclusion
Existing research on content warnings, content notes, and trigger warnings suggests that they are fruitless, although they do reliably induce a period of uncomfortable anticipation. Although many questions warrant further investigation, trigger warnings should not be used as a mental-health tool.
So, right in that meta-analysis, it was showing that all but one study they reviewed indicated that content warnings increased avoidance, and that in cases of avoidance anticipatory anxiety was slightly raised. Which makes sense, that’s what anxiety is. The analysis also showed that non-avoidance with a content warning did not improve anxiety responses through time to emotionally and mentally prepare for the content, compared to exposure without a content warning.
So… it gives people the choice to not engage, and offers a better outcome if you choose to not engage. Yeah, there’s more anxiety than if you didn’t come across the content warning (or content) at all, but it offers choice.
I think the how and when content warnings are used needs to be further refined and more uniformly applied, but this meta-analysis does not conclude “content warnings are a bane to society”.
I would also like to see a deeper dive scrutinizing which situations call for it and which don’t. For instance, a game like Doke Doke Literature Club absolutely needs to warn people because it is a rug pull at its heart that switches to a truly twisted, horrific display of trauma/meta story telling, so people would have walked into a potentially traumatizing trap without a trigger warning. A game like that it would be irresponsible to not have one.
To put it another way: trigger warnings are probably more effective in situations where a person can’t reasonably assume there are going to be potentially traumatizing moments/themes/etc. If you are going to see a WWII movie, you probably don’t need a trigger warning about violence/explosions/guns/etc. Though this is just my assumption and I would be very curious to see a breakdown of different situations. Suffice to say I imagine different situations call for it more than others, so making a blanket statement saying they are ineffective (other commenter) is also wrong on that front.
The conclusions that OP made about that study is quite interesting to me personally cause I experience both sides of it. There are certain content warnings that I take note of and decide if I have the mental energy to consume the content healthily. Sometimes I’m completely fine, sometimes the warning has me on edge till it happens, and sometimes I decide to nope out for now.
Tho with a young teen in my house, it’s helpful to know if an episode of something is going to go into places that will mess with them or if it’s completely age in appropriate. If something has an 18+ rating for an episode but only has profanity and gore as the advisory, I’m fine with my 15 year old watching it. If it’s got nudity, sexual violence, eating disorder etc, then it’s going to be a pass (or at least screened or having a follow up convo).
Considering they share in a lot of the content I’m consuming, and the majority of my time is spent watching internet content rather than produced media. It’s one thing for Netflix to have an age rating and content warnings but I really appreciate warnings on YouTube video since it’s really hard to predict what’s going to come up.
I wonder if there would be significant differences if a wider range of content was included. For example: Books, websites, games, streams, YouTube, movies, series, music, podcasts.
Based on nothing but wild speculation, I think music would be at the bottom of effectiveness and books at the top.
Really interesting questions and considerations here. My kids are not that old, but I definitely think about how to manage potentially harmful content with them. It doesn’t help that the US has incredibly clear rules about how sex is portrayed on screen, but not blood/violence/gore/sexual violence in particular and the horrors that come with all of that. You go from decade to decade and PG-13/PG just radically shift all over the place - old Bond films are a classic example of this.
In the absence of somewhat legible MPAA ratings I just feel like more specific content warnings are a necessity.
Trigger warnings aren’t effective for everyone and can sometimes make things worse is what you mean
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/21677026231186625
So, right in that meta-analysis, it was showing that all but one study they reviewed indicated that content warnings increased avoidance, and that in cases of avoidance anticipatory anxiety was slightly raised. Which makes sense, that’s what anxiety is. The analysis also showed that non-avoidance with a content warning did not improve anxiety responses through time to emotionally and mentally prepare for the content, compared to exposure without a content warning.
So… it gives people the choice to not engage, and offers a better outcome if you choose to not engage. Yeah, there’s more anxiety than if you didn’t come across the content warning (or content) at all, but it offers choice.
I think the how and when content warnings are used needs to be further refined and more uniformly applied, but this meta-analysis does not conclude “content warnings are a bane to society”.
I would also like to see a deeper dive scrutinizing which situations call for it and which don’t. For instance, a game like Doke Doke Literature Club absolutely needs to warn people because it is a rug pull at its heart that switches to a truly twisted, horrific display of trauma/meta story telling, so people would have walked into a potentially traumatizing trap without a trigger warning. A game like that it would be irresponsible to not have one.
To put it another way: trigger warnings are probably more effective in situations where a person can’t reasonably assume there are going to be potentially traumatizing moments/themes/etc. If you are going to see a WWII movie, you probably don’t need a trigger warning about violence/explosions/guns/etc. Though this is just my assumption and I would be very curious to see a breakdown of different situations. Suffice to say I imagine different situations call for it more than others, so making a blanket statement saying they are ineffective (other commenter) is also wrong on that front.
The conclusions that OP made about that study is quite interesting to me personally cause I experience both sides of it. There are certain content warnings that I take note of and decide if I have the mental energy to consume the content healthily. Sometimes I’m completely fine, sometimes the warning has me on edge till it happens, and sometimes I decide to nope out for now.
Tho with a young teen in my house, it’s helpful to know if an episode of something is going to go into places that will mess with them or if it’s completely age in appropriate. If something has an 18+ rating for an episode but only has profanity and gore as the advisory, I’m fine with my 15 year old watching it. If it’s got nudity, sexual violence, eating disorder etc, then it’s going to be a pass (or at least screened or having a follow up convo).
Considering they share in a lot of the content I’m consuming, and the majority of my time is spent watching internet content rather than produced media. It’s one thing for Netflix to have an age rating and content warnings but I really appreciate warnings on YouTube video since it’s really hard to predict what’s going to come up.
I wonder if there would be significant differences if a wider range of content was included. For example: Books, websites, games, streams, YouTube, movies, series, music, podcasts.
Based on nothing but wild speculation, I think music would be at the bottom of effectiveness and books at the top.
Really interesting questions and considerations here. My kids are not that old, but I definitely think about how to manage potentially harmful content with them. It doesn’t help that the US has incredibly clear rules about how sex is portrayed on screen, but not blood/violence/gore/sexual violence in particular and the horrors that come with all of that. You go from decade to decade and PG-13/PG just radically shift all over the place - old Bond films are a classic example of this.
In the absence of somewhat legible MPAA ratings I just feel like more specific content warnings are a necessity.