Journalism as the Fourth Emergency Service

Foreword

Jo Healey

Do your job, do it well, do no harm…

Across thirty years as a journalist, I have interviewed hundreds of people whose lives and emotions have been shattered, as have many journalists. However, we are rarely taught how to go about it. Our industry tradition is that we effectively, or not, practise on the grieving public. We barely give a thought to the effect this work may be having on us.

“We’re not psychologists, we’re not counsellors and we’re not trained and we’re asking them to relive horrific moments in their lives,” says TV reporter Simon Hare.

For several years, I have been training journalists globally in how best to work with victims and survivors and how to look after themselves as they go about these emotionally tough assignments.

Whether covering harrowing court cases, hearing horrific accounts, or witnessing tragedies first hand or via graphic imagery, journalists may be impacted. They cannot unsee or unhear this stuff.

Vicious online abuse, cuts in newsroom budgets, and intensifying pressure to deliver material to multiple platforms all add to the mix.

“No story is worth a person’s mental health or a person’s life, not yours and not theirs either,” says BBC Paris Correspondent Lucy Williamson.

That is why this much-needed book is so important. It offers clear insight into why and how journalists may be affected by the stories they may be covering daily, from war zones to court rooms and just about everything in between. However, it does not shy away from the journalist’s mission to report and deliver.

Edited by Lisa Bradley and Emma Heywood, Journalism as the Fourth Emergency Service: Trauma and Resilience deep dives into the key issues for journalists covering trauma and distress. It not only shares invaluable insight from a raft of experts but also provides a wealth of important advice in the form of tips, talking points, and tasks for students and teachers alike. The innovative form of the book, as a “hybrid” academic-textbook, has something to offer everyone, from those researching trauma and journalism to those preparing to become journalists and those already in the field.

I have been lucky enough to work with some of Lisa and Emma’s journalism students at the University of Sheffield and to witness first-hand the progressive nature of their work in this growing field of trauma reporting.

In my training sessions, countless working journalists shared how much they wished they had been taught the basics of trauma reporting while at university, particularly how best to approach people at emotionally sensitive times and how to go about interviewing them.

As journalists, we are geared towards reflecting other people’s lives, and we forget that we too need some self-reflection and care. As the book points out, along with emergency responders, we can run towards the danger that others are fleeing, and this can take its toll on us.

BBC Middle East Editor Jeremy Bowen is a veteran of scores of international conflicts, wars, disasters and humanitarian crises. “The cost of spending years going to places where you see the best of humanity as well as the worst of humanity you do eventually pay some kind of price, and that’s why you need to be aware of your mental health, deal with things as they arise, talk always, share with your colleagues. Do not bottle it up,” he told me.

From attacks to abuse to lost homes, lost health, lost livelihoods and lost lives, we often tell our stories best through the people they affect. However, that can mean that so many journalists may be dealing regularly and closely with people who are suffering but who choose to share their painful experiences. It can be a relentless part of the job both in regular and conflict reporting.

Journalists need to know how to do this work well, know how it may affect them and their colleagues, and know what to do about it before, during and after the assignments. This book will enlighten and support them while hopefully making them better journalists.

Jo Healey, Author of Trauma Reporting, A Journalist’s Guide to Covering Sensitive Stories.

CHAPTER 1

Introduction

Emma Heywood and Lisa Bradley

Trauma in journalism is not a new phenomenon. From the battlefields to the city streets, humanitarian crises to the courtrooms, trauma has plagued the profession whether directly or indirectly, vicariously or through lived experience, since the ink dried on the first newspaper sheets in 1566.

A systematic review of studies conducted between 2010 and 2022 revealed significant numbers of journalists who reported either PTSD, PTSD symptoms, depression, and/or substance use (Flannery, 2022). Whilst it could be expected that these journalists would include war reporters and foreign correspondents given the nature of their job, it also includes “lower level” reporters whose jobs are perhaps not perceived as being so glamorous, but who cover, day in day out, the epitome of human misery. The build-up of this work-related trauma has long been considered to be just part of the job, but the increasing numbers of those leaving the industry because of mental health disorders (MHD) or associated medical conditions, to say nothing of new starters resigning after being forced to watch graphic videos just days into the job, all point to a broken, or even non-existent, support system that we can no longer ignore. If journalism, an essential and key part of democracy, is to be preserved, this darker side of the industry must be addressed.

Journalism has been called the fourth emergency service, rushing towards the danger rather than away. Unlike the fire, police and ambulance services, however, the role of a journalist is not to provide immediate help but rather to observe and report. An inaction that some would say is traumatic in itself (Osofsky et al., 2005; Osmann et al., 2021). However, journalists suffer in similar ways to the emergency services, witnessing the same horrors and victims (Cote & Simpson, 2000), but are additionally affected by their inability to act and provide direct help immediately. Moreover, unlike the emergency services, counselling or mental health support is not routinely offered to journalists.

The demand for trauma training is now at the forefront of the industry debate. In the UK, the National Council of Training for Journalists (NCTJ) has included safety and resilience in its accreditation requirements for training centres for 2024. This means that all journalism training courses that intend to deliver the NCTJ diploma must demonstrate how they educate their students in trauma literacy, resilience and safety awareness, both physically and mentally. The aim is to equip the next generation of journalists for the ever-growing harsh realities they face, as an increasing number of journalists work remotely, or hybrid, without the camaraderie or immediate support from senior and other journalists. Trauma is no longer seen as “just part of the job”; instead, there is an emerging recognition from newsrooms that reporters need to learn how to take care of themselves and their own mental health to do the job to the best of their ability.

And this starts in the classroom.