Amid escalation between the US and Iran, anxiety, fear and stress in response to potential war is quite common and that the best way to deal with it is to closely monitor news intake and lean on social support, writes Joan Cook for CNNOpinion
Joan Cook is an associate professor at Yale University and the 2016 president of the American Psychological Association's Division of Trauma Psychology. The opinions expressed in this commentary are her own. View more opinion on CNN.
Recent tensions between the United States and Iran and the underlying threat of war have many Americans on edge. After a US air strike in Baghdad on January 3 killed Gen. Qasem Soleimani, Iran's influential military commander and a power broker of terror in the Middle East, the Iranians vowed harsh revenge. They kept their promise by bombing US military bases in Iraq holding US troops.
As a trauma psychologist, I can very well understand public fear and anxiety resulting from this military escalation and the uncertainty it has generated about the future. An important study last year indicated that Americans were already suffering from a rising anxiety epidemic, particularly about health, safety and finances, and these new events will surely get people even more jacked up when our health can least afford it.
This cycle of fear and anxiety in response to a war or terror threat is not unique to our times. Actual or threatened bioterrorism attacks impacted people's fears in previous eras as well. In fact one study developed and tested a measure of nuclear war anxiety. The authors demonstrated how nuclear war anxiety was primarily made up of feelings of depression, despair and fear of what the future might bring.
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