Touched by Tragedy

Extending previous findings, this research examined conditions under which individuals connect to tragic movies about the loss of loved ones. Drawing on Terror Management Theory and TEBOTS, an experimental study examined the hypothesis that mortality salience would increase self-story connections, especially for highly emotional (versus moderately emotional) videos about the loss of a loved one. 194 Participants were randomly assigned to a 3 (Mortality Salience: Self vs. Loved One vs. Control) X 2 (Emotional Intensity of Tragic Movies: Moderate vs. High) between subjects design, and completed measures of Death Thought Accessibility (DTA), mixed affect, boundary expansion, and identification.