August 2011
Roxane Cohen Silver, Professor of Psychology and Social Behavior, was quoted in a recent New York Times article about the mental fallout from the September 11th attacks. The mental fallout has taught psychologists far more about their field’s limitations than about their potential to shape and predict behavior. Experts greatly overestimated the number of people in New York who would suffer lasting emotional distress. “You have to understand,” Silver said, “that before 9/11 we didn’t have any good way to estimate the response to something like this other than — well, estimates” based on earthquakes and other trauma.
