What it really feels like to be triggered
It's not about being offended and why 80% of people reading this probably aren’t being triggered
My trigger points
The pandemic was a traumatic event for billions of people around the world. A small percentage of people who experience trauma will go on to develop post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) — sensitivity to sounds, flashbacks, anxiety, and overwhelming thoughts. Those who were in full lockdowns and isolated for long periods of time will probably have it the worst. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the estimated prevalence of PTSD in the general population is around 3.9% or over 300 million people. But this number could be higher after the pandemic, up to 20%. We just don’t know.
What I do know is that I had debilitating PTSD symptoms that went on for a long time. For example, I was running my startup cooped up during the pandemic until I got sick and tired of it. I’ve written about my burnout experience extensively. During that time, I was involved in planning many online events and webinars, which was the source of a lot of anguish. Two years later, I’d stopped working on the business and moved back to Japan. I was involved in planning an offline meditation event (totally unrelated to my previous business) with a friend of mine. It was fun, at first.
But early on in planning this event, when my friend was being slow to respond, I had waves of panic suddenly wash over me. This was followed by memories of a past colleague and project I’d worked on that came flooding in. This wasn’t a little bit of stress or frustration, it was like being hit by a freight train. My thoughts became extremely scattered, I became irritable and anxious. Honestly, at one point I was questioning my own sanity. It all felt like I was a bit on Shutter Island. This “episode” lasted for several hours and left me unable to work or think straight.
Now that’s what I call a trigger. One minute I’m having a conversation, the next I’m thrust into a chaotic vortex of overwhelming physical sensations and strong emotions. The feeling of being trapped during the pandemic was traumatizing, and these specific work-related memories and situations became associated with that trauma. Months later, similar situations occurred that triggered me. These triggers would occur whenever there was any planning of an event that involved a timeline, coupled with a certain type of communication style. It was a clear trigger with a clear reaction.
Unfortunately, this isn’t what many people mean by the phrase “that’s triggering.” Instead, the word is overused in the same way “I’m burned out” is overused. It’s turned into a cop-out phrase for those who are offended by a topic, or an excuse for many to voice their frustration. Even for those who do suffer from real trauma, the rise of trigger warnings don’t seem to actually help. So what’s going on exactly?
The coddling of the American mind
Over the last few years many college campuses have removed triggering material from their courses or required teachers to add warnings before sharing sensitive topics. Topics around racism or sex, for example, could make students feel unsafe or marginalized. Google searches for ‘trigger warnings’ have gone up steadily since 2015. Many college students have demanded these warnings to be added in their classes in fear of being triggered. As recently as last month, Cornell University’s student body agreed to include trigger warnings. One student explains her reasoning: “Trigger warnings help prepare me emotionally for what I’m about to read or watch.”
On the surface, I can relate to this. I recently switched on a movie called Day Shift, a vampire action-horror-comedy starring Jamie Foxx. The first few minutes of the movie featured a contorted vampire lady being blasted away by a sawed-off shotgun. This was disturbing and made my skin crawl. So I turned it off. Perhaps I expected a comedy-horror to be lighter and funnier, however, I can see why someone would want a clearer warning. The age/film ratings didn’t do it justice.
But are these warnings really effective? If I had still decided to watch the movie, would I have somehow been less emotionally jarred if I had known that it would be more disturbing? Are we being way too sensitive here?
In the book The Coddling of the American Mind, the authors argue that while it’s important to be mindful of trauma, issuing trigger warnings or removing sensitive material doesn’t make people less anxious. “If we protect children from various classes of potentially upsetting experiences,” they argue, “we make it far more likely that those children will be unable to cope with such events when they leave our protective umbrella.” Trigger warnings make students more fragile, more anxious and less resilient.
For some people, these warnings are a way to avoid dealing with difficult issues or ideas that make them uncomfortable. Of course, avoidance is an unhealthy coping mechanism. It’s like drinking to avoid your relationship issues, or faking a sudden phone call because you’re not comfortable being assertive. Further, it can lead to playing the victim. Particularly on college campuses where group-think, political correctness and increased partisanship are on the rise, trigger warnings are a dangerous addition to the mix. This isn’t even mentioning the implications for free speech.
However, there’s a caveat to all of this…
Why trigger warnings aren’t good or bad
The data on both sides isn’t totally convincing. One recent study found that trigger warnings had neither a positive or negative impact. It didn’t relieve any of the emotional distress. But it also didn’t make people more anxious. The impact, rather, seemed more or less neutral.
The claim that people become more fragile or avoid the material also doesn’t hold up. Interestingly, when students had the choice to avoid triggering material, only 6% of them took that option. In fact, there was a bit of a “Pandora’s Box” effect, where people tended to re-engage with material that was triggering because they were curious (“oh, gratuitous violence and sex? yes please!”). We just can’t help ourselves.
What’s going on? Why aren’t these warnings as effective (or harmful) as we thought? The researchers suggest one possible reason: most people don’t even know what to do with a trigger warning. When they come across a warning, they just take it with a brief (and weak) acknowledgement, “Okay, yeah, I’m more ready for some violence now...” But they’re not really ready. They approach the material in the same way they always do.
In order for a trigger warning to be at least somewhat effective, you first need to have a healthy coping mechanism to deal with the potentially disturbing material. Without this, it’s useless. For example, you can give yourself a reminder to focus on the non-emotional aspects of the situation. Or, a mindfulness technique where you can non-judgmentally tune into your own reactions and bodily sensations when you’re reading or watching the triggering material. There are other techniques like grounding and cognitive restructuring (in CBT) that you could use during triggering situations.
Without the toolkit of these healthy coping mechanisms, a trigger warning is pretty much useless. In fact, when you know there’s a trigger coming, there’s even anxiety that can build up in anticipation of the trigger. This anxiety goes away, but does nothing to actually relieve the trigger when experienced. So at worst, trigger warnings make you a little bit anxious, and the impact the content has on you doesn’t change either way.
Perhaps this implies that there’s a benefit to trigger warnings if you have a robust emotional toolkit. But it makes me wonder. If you're self-aware enough to have a range of techniques to regulate your thoughts and emotions, then do you even need a trigger warning? It seems that these skills would be enough to deal with the situation when it’s presented.
When your spouse is angry at you, you’ve either developed a skillful way to communicate during conflict or you haven’t. You’ll drop down to your default training or habit in the situation — whether that is listening and taking a mindful pause, or getting immediately caught up in reactivity. Is knowing that they are angry a few seconds or minutes beforehand going to make a huge difference?
Now, none of this debate is to say that triggers aren’t real. They are very real, and they suck. There’s just a problem of definition.
What is a trigger, anyway?
A friend told me about a cross-cultural communication workshop at her company. The facilitator mentioned a story that involved a woman who was coerced into having sex with a fisherman. Later, a few of the attendees complained that the material was triggering. If these attendees simply found it offensive or inappropriate, they’re entitled to their opinion. But that’s not a trigger.
The term trigger originally comes from post-traumatic-stress (PTSD) diagnosis before it was more broadly (and loosely) adopted. In clinical psychology, a trigger is defined as “an event, object, or experience that elicits a strong emotional reaction or flashback to a traumatic event.” It is specifically linked to past trauma you’ve had as an individual that hasn’t been resolved.
Now, in the the above example of the workshop, a victim of sexual assault holding past trauma could certainly have experienced a trigger from that story. Given that at least one in five women experiences some form of sexual abuse in their lives, it’s not unreasonable to believe that the workshop could have been triggering for some. (but again, it doesn’t mean that a trigger warning is a net positive for relieving that person’s trauma)
Another example: Imagine you were in a car accident years ago. Watching a movie with a car crash, or even hearing about a person’s death in a fatal car accident could be triggering. News of Paul Walker’s (from Fast and Furious fame) death could cause a cascade of images from your own accident, a racing heart beat, tightness in your chest and an inability to concentrate on anything for hours or longer. This panic or anxiety attack could be minor and short-lived or it could be pervasive and totally debilitating.
Not every traumatic event in your life turns into post-traumatic stress disorder. Only a small percentage of people who have a traumatic event will experience PTSD symptoms. There are several factors that influence this, like your personality, severity of the situation, the setting you were in and your ability to get back to a safe place. Perhaps you did have post-traumatic stress, but you’ve resolved it through somatic therapy, EMDR therapy, support groups, creative expression, yoga or mindfulness. (In fact, yoga was a more effective treatment for PTSD than any drug available on the market!)
But if the trauma remains unprocessed, as it does for many people, then it’s very possible that the trauma is dormant. And there could be many trigger points, from a sound you hear or a situation you find yourself in at work. This could cause you to re-experience your traumatic event as if you were still living it. Trauma researcher Peter Levine says that "the unresolved traumas from our past are the biggest obstacles to our happiness and well-being in the present."
Big Trauma and little trauma
Dr. Gabor Maté distinguishes between "big T" trauma and "little t" trauma. Big T traumas are typically defined as major events that involve actual or threatened death, serious injury, or sexual violence. Examples of big T traumas include physical or sexual abuse, natural disasters, war, or a life-threatening illness. It’s easy to imagine how many people can suffer from PTSD after experiencing this sort of trauma.
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to Misha Yurchenko's Newsletter to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.