Please see Kaethe Weingarten's (2003) book Common Shock: Witnessing Violence Every Day - How We Are Harmed, How We Can Heal (New York, NY: Dutton).

Please see the press release here:

Every single day, whether we realize it or not, we witness and are affected by violence — often with serious, long-term consequences.

At times the violence is extraordinary, impossible to neglect: the terrorist attacks of 9/11 make us anxious—even panicky—unable to sleep. More often the violence is mundane: the customer ahead of us in the cafeteria line berates the cashier and we feel inexplicably edgy for hours. Most of the time we don't even notice: our 12-year-old watches a murder on television (one of the more than 100,000 acts of TV violence he has seen by that age) and zones out.

In her revolutionary new book, Common Shock, Harvard Medical School psychologist Kaethe Weingarten, Ph.D., defines a problem that up until now had no name. Drawing on the latest scientific research and her years of clinical and community experience, Kaethe Weingarten describes common shock— the biological and psychological responses that are triggered when we witness violence. It is common, because it happens all the time, to everyone in any community. It is a shock, because whether our response is spaciness, distress, or bravado, it affects our mind, body and spirit.

Addressing the full range of violence we all experience, Dr. Weingarten then offers us tools to take effective action, including:

• How to manage the physical symptoms of common shock
• How to cope with the suffering of those who are ill or dying
• How parents can help children who witness violence
• How ordinary citizens can make a difference

Practical, hopeful, and inspirational, this breakthrough guide lets us discover what we can do in our homes and neighborhoods to transform common shock into a compassionate prescription for healing ourselves, our families, our communities, and the world.

Please read here about the author:

Kaethe Weingarten, Ph.D., is an Associate Clinical Professor of Psychology at Harvard Medical School and a faculty member of the Family Institute of Cambridge. She is founder and director of The Witnessing Project, a nonprofit organization that consults to individuals, families, and communities locally, nationally, and internationally to transform toxic witnessing of violence and violation to active compassionate witnessing with others. She currently supervises at the internationally renowned Victims of Violence Program at Cambridge Health Alliance.

Dr. Weingarten graduated from Smith College with a distinction and received her Ph.D. from Harvard University in three years. She has worked as a psychotherapist and family therapist for over thirty years. She has worked in Kosovo and South Africa for the last several years, addressing issues of community-wide trauma. In addition to her clinical and consulting work, she lectures widely here and abroad, and has just completed a visiting lectureship in New Zealand.

Earlier, Dr. Weingarten directed the family therapy training program at Children's Hospital and Judge Baker Children's Center from 1979-1986 and was Clinical Director of the Trauma Evaluation and Treatment Team based at Judge Baker Children's Center, from 1987-1999.

She has appeared on "Good Morning America" and other programs, and her work has been recognized by The New York Times and The Boston Globe, and by a number of professional honors. Most recently, she was awarded the 2002 Distinguished Contribution to Family Therapy Theory and Practice of the American Family Therapy Academy. In 1997 and 1998 she was honored as a Fellow in Divisions 43 (Family) and 35 (Psychology of Women) respectively of the American Psychological Association, an honor held by fewer than 2% of the membership. In 1995 she was co-recipient of the Psychotherapy with Women Award of Division 35.

Dr. Weingarten has published six previous books, over 20 peer-reviewed articles and 11 book chapters. She served on the board of directors of the American Family Therapy Academy for six years, is currently on the editorial boards of five journals and is also Chair of the Human Rights Committee of the American Family Therapy Academy.

She is a breast cancer survivor, having survived cancer in 1988 and 1993, and has written extensively about these experiences.

Dr. Weingarten lives with her husband, Hilary G. Worthen, a physician, in a suburb outside of Boston. They have two adult children