FaniLab Racial Trauma Research Featured in The American Prospect

The American Prospect is a magazine dedicated promoting discussion of American politics and public policy. On June 6th, the magazine published an article exploring the detrimental effects of racial trauma on Black women.

“Racial trauma is the study of how racially sensitive incidents can impart PTSD-like symptoms, such as depression, anxiety, and anger,” the author, Ramenda Cyrus, explains.

In 2021, the Fani Lab published a study in JAMA Psychiatry that showed exactly that. In Black women who had experienced more frequent racial discrimination, areas of the brain responsible for emotion regulation, fear inhibition, and visual attention showed proportionally more activation. This pattern suggests that racial discrimination can increase vigilance for future threat vigilance and lead to increased self-monitoring, emotion regulation and suppression, all of which encumbers the brain and body’s resources. This can increase vulnerability for the development of problems such as PTSD, anxiety and depression.

The study was referenced in the article to inform readers about the emerging science of racial trauma.

The article – and the FaniLab’s work more generally – brings attention to the burden that racial trauma has on the brain and body. In recent years, racially-motivated events have inundated broadcast news and social media. These high-profile incidents “made racism ubiquitous and unavoidable” writes Cyrus. Improving both public awareness and scientific interest in racial trauma research will lead to improvements in intervention strategies that benefit BIPOC communities.

Read The American Prospect article here.

Read the original research article here.