By Robert L. DuPont, M.D., Elizabeth DuPont Spencer, MSW, and Caroline M. DuPont, M.D.
Posted: Tuesday, December 3, 2002
Publication Date: December 3, 2002
The September 11 attacks, anthrax attacks, and D.C. sniper shootings a year later, each relatively localized geographically, led to anxiety on a global scale. Coping with the fear of terrorism is a new imperative of modern life if millions of people are not to become housebound like agoraphobics.
| This article is condensed from a chapter of the book The Anxiety Cure by Robert L. DuPont, M.D., Elizabeth DuPont Spencer, MSW, and Caroline M. DuPont, M.D. (John Wiley & Sons, revised edition 2003) |
Inducing fear has long been a tactic in war. What is new that makes terrorism so powerful is the role of the global mass media — the unwitting vector for fear, which is the primary weapon of modern terrorism.
Fear and anxiety are malignant diseases of the "what ifs." The fear of weapons of mass destruction in the hands of elusive terrorists is a classic what-if fear. Even if terrorists never or rarely use chemical, biological, or nuclear weapons, it is the possibility that spreads and intensifies the fear of future attacks. The fear is heightened by our uncertainty about the number of bin Laden sympathizers, much as we were uncertain whether Timothy McVeigh spoke for large numbers of anti-government activists or was unique in his violent response to government.
The Mechanisms for Fear Are in Every Brain
In the Washington area in October, during the series of sniper attacks, we were busy practicing as mental health professionals. We were often asked if we had a huge influx of new anxious patients spurred into therapy by the snipers. The answer may surprise you. Not a single patient sought our help during those three weeks because of the attacks. Here is another observation from our practice that may be almost as surprising: Our chronically anxious patients were not particularly disturbed by the snipers' bullets during that reign of terror. Many of our chronically anxious patients were even relieved during that time in what at first appears to be an odd way. They felt more normal in their fears when everyone around them was so clearly disturbed by their own fears.
One patient said, "I feel sorry for these 'normal' people who have not had fear like this before. They don't know what is happening to them. They have no idea what to do about it. For me, the sniper is just one more fear to add to the long list of dreadful fears that I have endured for decades. Every day my son goes to school I fear that he will be kidnapped or killed in an automobile accident. Every day of my life when I have a pain in my stomach or my head I am sure that it's a fatal cancer. The sniper is bad and I or someone in my family may be his next target, but this fear is easier to deal with than most fears of mine because with this fear I have so much company."
Fear mechanisms are in everyone's brains, not just in the brains of those who suffer from anxiety disorders. By studying people with anxiety problems we have learned about these brain mechanisms and how to help people when their fear mechanisms go awry.
Fear Factors
Five characteristics a threat may have that appear to heighten fear in most of us are:
1) Unfamiliarity
2) Being beyond our personal control
3) Potential for catastrophic events
4) Unpredictability of risk
5) Human as opposed to natural causes of danger
If we are unable to gauge the likelihood of strangers harming us in devastating ways — and feel that there is little we can do about it — we are likely to feel anxiety. Two factors augmenting our fear of terrorism in particular are the media and political forces, which each have incentives to emphasize the fear.
In fact, the odds of being killed by terrorists are very small compared to everyday risks such as death from smoking or car accidents, but we are accustomed to these risks, and they are harder to perceive, since, for example, all those who die from smoking do not do so in a single place at a single time before the eyes of the world. In most ways, Americans today are safer than any people in human history, but the media — and sometimes our political leaders — have unprecedented power to focus our attention on exotic new risks. Indeed, they may feel they are acting irresponsibly if they fail to draw our attention to a new risk.
How Responsible Leaders Should Fight Terrorism
So what do we recommend to leaders in these difficult times when it comes to the fear of modern terrorism? We would like to see leaders who clearly articulate that the terrorists' number one goal is to provoke and to sustain our fear. Therefore, the number one goal of our anti-terrorism efforts needs to be to reduce public fear.
This has been called a new kind of war. One of the most important ways in which it is new is that fear is the principal weapon. One way to reduce fear is to put the risks of terrorism into more familiar perspective, not to deny them or to trivialize them, but to put them into honest, realistic perspective. This also means that we need to be prepared for causalities in this new war, from both domestic and foreign terrorists, for the foreseeable future. In fact there will be casualties until we no longer fear terrorism and it ceases to be a worthwhile tactic for our enemies.
How Individuals Can Fight Fear
Our clinical experience has shown us that when people confront their fears, not only do they reclaim their lives but they experience a huge leap in self-esteem. Many anxious people who have overcome their fears are eager to help others who are still trapped in fear. It is our hope that modern terrorism will catalyze this recovery process on a community level. If that happens, then terrorism will prove not to be a crippling threat but a call to psychological arms that will generate enduring benefits. Perhaps Americans, as a people, can develop an immunity to the fear of terrorism. If our country does that, we will have struck a fatal blow against modern terrorism.
Here are eight steps we recommend taking on a personal level to reduce the fear of terrorism:
1) Understand that the central goal of terrorists is to provoke terror. Fear terrorism and it grows. Stop fearing terrorism and it withers away and will, eventually, disappear because terrorism will no longer work as a political weapon.
2) Put the risks of terrorist attacks into the perspective relative to other serious, but more familiar, risks.
3) Support the efforts of the authorities — including the military, police, fire, and rescue workers — to curb terrorism and to punish terrorist perpetrators.
4) Encourage leaders who help people put the risks of terrorism into perspective, leaders who balance their efforts to combat terrorism with other important priorities.
5) Limit the time you and your families spend with the media during terrorist threats.
6) Help children to face the threats of terrorism realistically and to feel confident that they are protected by caring adults, including their teachers and parents as well as police.
7) Reach out in friendship to people in all groups in American society. Avoid stigmatizing whole groups of Americans such as Muslims and Arabs. For people who themselves are in these groups, reach out to other Americans and let them know what you think about modern terrorism. Again, familiarity reduces fear.
8) Go about your daily activities being productive and active despite terrorist threats.
The threat of modern terrorism is not America's alone. This threat is part of life in the modern world. Coping with fear needs to be as much a part of our modern armamentarium against terrorism as smallpox vaccination, antibiotic treatments for anthrax, and searches at airports.
