Up to six University of Colorado at Boulder researchers will attend a workshop at New York University Dec. 12-13 to present findings related to emergency response and recovery efforts following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on America.
The researchers were among 17 from around the nation who were funded by the CU-Boulder Natural Hazards Center, in cooperation with the National Science Foundation, to study social and behavioral aspects of the attacks as part of its Quick Response Research Program.
The Sept. 11 attacks raised many of the same issues people face following catastrophic events such as hurricanes and earthquakes, said center co-director Mary Fran Myers, coordinator of the Quick Response program. The program allows researchers to conduct field research during the immediate aftermath of disastrous events.
The NYU workshop will bring together researchers and public policy experts to present their findings and identify where future research is needed.
Lori Peek, a doctoral student in sociology at CU-Boulder, will present her findings on the impact of Sept. 11 on Arab and Muslim college students in New York City and Colorado. She conducted group interviews with a total of 93 Arab and Muslim students on six university campuses in New York and four university campuses in Colorado.
Most of the students expressed fear, particularly women whose head scarves made them highly visible targets, she found. Some students reported being spit on, one student was physically attacked and almost all reported verbal abuse. Â鶹ÒùÔº reported more incidents of harassment in New York than in Colorado.
Peek recalled going down an escalator in Grand Central Station with one of her interviewees, a Muslim woman wearing a head scarf. She noted that of the crowd of people moving up the adjoining escalator, "every person seemed to be looking at the student in a suspicious or fearful manner."
However, there also were positive experiences. Arab and Muslim students were heartened by the large numbers of people trying to understand and learn more about Islam and the Middle East, she said. Prior to Sept. 11, most people hadn't expressed any interest.
Â鶹ÒùÔº in both New York and Colorado also appreciated official statements from university administrators that decried targeting people because of their different faith or appearance, she said. She noted that some of the students who were targeted for abuse had lived in New York City their entire lives.
"I hope to give a voice to the thoughts and feelings of people who were largely invisible prior to Sept. 11," she said.
Jeannette Sutton, an ordained Presbyterian minister and a doctoral student in sociology at CU-Boulder, is studying spiritual support in New York City, organized through the Spiritual Care Aviation Incident Response Team, a branch of American Red Cross Disaster Services.
Sutton, who worked for the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office as coordinator of Victim Services for Columbine High School following the 1999 school shootings, went to New York City to examine the response of the faith-based organizations.
While there was no organized spiritual care and counseling available following Columbine, it has been very much a part of the recovery process in New York, she said. Although spiritual counseling is linked with mental health, there are important differences.
"Clergy represent something to people that is different from a doctor," Sutton said. "They represent a connection to God. If I was a victim, and I had questions about belief and meaning, I'm not sure I'd want to go to a mental health practitioner when I could go to a clergy member."
In addition to organizational issues of providing accredited clergy for people of different faiths, there also are practical questions such as how to hold a memorial service for someone whose body was never recovered, she said. Sutton hopes this research will help disaster emergency response agencies to consider providing a coordinated spiritual care response to many different types of disasters.
The Quick Response Research Program allowed her to visit New York City and work with local faith-based organizations. That experience led to the focus for her work, which now will become her dissertation, she said.
Both Peek and Sutton were awarded a $1,000 Beverly Sears Graduate Student Grant to do additional research connected with their projects.
Information on the Dec. 12-13 NYU workshop agenda is posted at . For more information on the CU-Boulder Natural Hazards Center's Quick Response Research Program visit .