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Language use in imagined dialogue and narrative disclosures of trauma *
Author(s) -
Burke Philip A.,
Bradley Rebekah G.
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
journal of traumatic stress
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.259
H-Index - 134
eISSN - 1573-6598
pISSN - 0894-9867
DOI - 10.1002/jts.20102
Subject(s) - narrative , psychology , cognition , task (project management) , variation (astronomy) , cognitive psychology , social psychology , linguistics , psychiatry , philosophy , physics , management , astrophysics , economics
Support exists in many populations for the use of written disclosure to express thoughts and emotions about a traumatic experience. The present study examined language use in a variation of the writing task modified to include an imagined dialogue with another person. We hypothesized that this method would increase cognitive, affective, and present‐tense word use, all of which are linked with beneficial outcomes from writing. We randomly assigned 169 college students to write in one of three conditions: trauma narrative, trauma dialogue, or control writing. Results suggested that writing about traumatic experiences in the form of a dialogue promotes greater present‐oriented, affective experiencing and cognitive processing than does writing in the form of a narrative.