UC Irvine researchers discovered that six or more daily hours of watching, reading or listening to media reports of the Boston Marathon bombings in the week afterward was linked to "more acute stress than having been at or near the marathon," according to a report on Medicalxpress.com
"We were very surprised at the degree to which repeated media exposure was so strongly associated with acute stress symptoms," said E. Alison Holman, associate professor of nursing science at UC Irvine and the study's lead author. "We suspect that there's something about repeated exposure to violent images or sounds that keeps traumatic events alive and can prolong the stress response in vulnerable people. There is mounting evidence that live and video images of traumatic events can trigger flashbacks and encourage fear conditioning. If repeatedly viewing traumatic images reactivates fear or threat responses in the brain and promotes rumination, there could be serious health consequences."
http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-12-prolonged-viewing-boston-marathon-media.html
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