Attending to Our Own Trauma: Promoting Vicarious Resilience and Preventing Vicarious Traumatization among Researchers

Vicarious trauma refers to the cognitive and affective impacts of trauma exposure through one’s work, with traumatization indicating negative effects and resilience, positive. While vicarious trauma has been studied among practitioners, little is known about trauma exposure’s effects on researchers. This exploratory study addresses this gap through an examination of vicarious trauma policies and procedures used by a homicide research team, and aims to understand if and how research assistants (RAs) were affected by reading homicide case files, how they took care of themselves while working, and how the policies supported their well-being. Eleven RAs participated in focus groups and interviews and responded to a quantitative survey about their experiences. Data were analyzed using thematic analysis and descriptive statistics. All RAs mentioned traumatic impact, noting that certain factors increased or buffeted against traumatization. RAs described several means of supporting their own well-being, such as cooking or talking with friends. Findings indicated the trauma-informed policies, and the related informal team dynamics, were core to promoting RAs’ well-being. It is imperative that future studies proactively promote vicarious resilience among team members to ensure sustainable and accurate data collection, prevent RA burnout, and effectively train future researchers to sustain their work throughout their careers.