Reactions to 9/11 as a function of terror management and perspective taking

Abstract

The authors used terror management theory to investigate people's reactions to the terrorist attacks of 09/11/01. According to the theory, people have a primary need to eliminate or reduce existential terror in response to such horrific events as 9/11. The authors obtained people's reactions to 9/11, an event in which the threat to one's existence was more authentic than those of previous events that were imagined. The authors of the present study collected data two weeks after 9/11 from young adults on a large university campus in the U.S. Midwest. The authors asked participants about their proximal and distal reactions to 9/11 and their reasons or motives for those reactions. The results indicated that the vast majority of participants' proximal reactions to 9/11 were shock and/or disbelief, whereas their distal reactions included performing altruistic or prosocial behavior, searching for meaning or value in life, seeking or sharing information, spending time in talking to others, and making bigoted remarks about Arab Muslims. The main finding was that interpersonal communication is an important means of eliminating or reducing existential terror.