Triggering the effectiveness of warnings: the impact of warnings on emotions, attitudes, and learning.

Boysen, GA, Isaacs, RA, Tretter, L., and Markowski, S. (2021) Triggering the effectiveness of warnings: the impact of warnings on emotions, attitudes, and learning. Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Psychology, 7(1), 39-52. https://doi.org/10.1037/stl0000150

Commentary

This study will be an investigation of the effectiveness of triggered warnings.

Trigger warnings are intended to prevent distress by providing advance notice of sensitive topics, but there is no support for their effectiveness in psychology education.

This study was investigating the effects of trigger warnings on emotions, learning, and attitudes.

In Study 1 (N = 353), a video lecture on sexual assault was presented as an online sample, and participants reported positive and negative affect before and after the video.

They also tested this content, reported the need for warnings, and found that learning about sexual assault made a significant difference in participants' emotions, regardless of whether or not they had personal experiences related to the topic. And trigger warnings did not have a significant effect on emotions or test score changes. However, trigger warnings did result in a significant increase in participants' belief that the topic of sexual assault requires a warning.

Study 2 (N = 412) used the topic of suicide and was a replication of Study 1. It was found that trigger warnings did not have a significant impact on the scores, nor on the changes to be tested, but it did result in a significant increase in the perception of warnings as needed.

Study 3 then examined college students (N = 105) who were learning about sexual assault. They did not show a significant effect of trigger warnings on changes in emotions or test scores, but they did show a significant effect on the belief that there is a need.

These overall results showed that trigger warnings do not affect emotion or learning, but they do increase the belief that warnings are necessary for sensitive topics.