"Journalists have often been considered the "fourth emergency service". They are first on the scene, alongside paramedics, fi re and police, running towards danger rather than away, and providing independent, veritable and crucial information in the public interest. And yet, unlike frontline workers
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, little (if any) counselling or training is offered to journalists on how to deal with the horrors they witness, and the trauma they absorb from being at the forefront of human suffering. Further, limited to no training is given to student journalists on how to prepare themselves for trauma, be it from war scenes to the everyday "death knock". New research is demonstrating a rise in post-traumatic stress disorder amongst journalists resulting from the "everyday" trauma they encounter. There is also a noticeable increase in reluctance from new journalists to undertake emotionally distressing assignments. Editors in industry are now calling for educators to invest in curricula that centre around understanding how to cope with distress and trauma, and why work like this is vital to facilitate the work journalists do hold power to account. This book investigates the cause and effect of trauma reporting on the journalist themselves and provides a toolkit for training journalists and practitioners to build resilience and prepare themselves for trauma. It draws on national and international experiences enabling readers to gain valuable insight into a range of contemporary issues and the contexts in which they may work. This edited book offers a blend of academic research studies, evidence-based practitioner interviews, and teaching resources drawing on the experiences of journalists and academics nationally and internationally." (Abstract)
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"In this contribution, using a case-study approach, we focus on the assassination of Ján Kuciak and his fiancée and explore the impact and consequences that it had on the community of investigative journalists in Slovakia. By conducting a series of semi-structured interviews with top investigative
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journalists (N = 12), we seek to answer two questions: How have they coped with the murder of their colleague? And, how has this incident changed their everyday journalistic practices and routines when it comes to achieving and maintaining safety? We identified 12 coping actions which, based on their function, were organised into five higher order families of coping: emotional purging; sharing and support seeking; avoidance and displacement; defiance and defence; and spreading the legacy and giving meaning to the tragedy. Regarding safety and security practices, the journalists claim that their approach has fundamentally changed. A variety of measures to stay safe, both online and offline, were adopted both on the organisational and on the individual level. However, many of these measures are not used consistently, mostly because they are not deemed necessary when covering non-sensitive topics, but also because of their impracticality in everyday journalistic work, and sceptical and fatalistic approach of the journalists to safety." (Abstract)
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