African-American adolescents' stress responses after the 9/11/01 terrorist attacks.
OBJECTIVE
To examine the impact of indirect exposure to the 9/11/01 attacks upon physical and emotional stress-related responses in a community sample of African-American (AA) adolescents.


METHODS
Three months after the 9/11/01 terrorist attacks, 406 AA adolescents (mean age [SD] of 16.1 +/- 1.3 years) from an inner-city high school in Augusta, GA were evaluated with a 12-item 5-point Likert scale measuring loss of psychosocial resources (PRS) such as control, hope, optimism, and perceived support, a 17-item 5-point Likert scale measuring post-traumatic stress symptomatology (PCL), and measures of state and trait anger, anger expression, and hostility. Given the observational nature of the study, statistical differences and correlations were evaluated for effect size before statistical testing (5% minimum variance explained). Bootstrapping was used for testing mean differences and differences between correlations.


RESULTS
PCL scores indicated that approximately 10% of the sample was experiencing probable clinically significant levels of post-traumatic distress (PCL score > 50). The PCL and PRS were moderately correlated with a r = .59. Gender differences for the PCL and PRS were small, accounting for 1% of the total variance. Higher PCL scores were associated with higher state anger (r = .47), as well as measures of anger-out (r = .32) and trait anger (r = .34). Higher PRS scores were associated only with higher state anger (r = .27). Scores on the two 9/11/01-related scales were not statistically associated (i.e., less than 5% of the variance explained) with traits of anger control, anger-in, or hostility.


CONCLUSIONS
The majority of students were not overly stressed by indirect exposure to the events of 9/11/01, perhaps owing to the temporal, social, and/or geographical distance from the event. Those who reported greater negative impact appeared to also be experiencing higher levels of current anger and exhibited a characterologic style of higher overt anger expression.
Barnes
Vernon A
VA
Department of Pediatrics, Georgia Institute for Prevention of Human Diseases and Accidents, Medical College of Georgia, Augusta, GA, USA. vbarnes@mail.mdg.edu
Treiber
Frank A
FA
Ludwig
David A
DA
D000293:Adolescent; D001741:Black or African American / Q000523:psychology*; D000786:Anger; D004644:Emotions; D005260:Female; D005845:Georgia; D006304:Health Status; D006306:Health Surveys; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales; D047851:September 11 Terrorist Attacks / Q000523:psychology*; D013315:Stress, Psychological; D014505:Urban Population
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