How Is Collective Trauma Different From Individual Trauma?

Boy_Anupong via Getty Images Understanding collective trauma can help you work on your mental health during difficult times. “Individual trauma is a traumatic event that happens to a person, whereas collective trauma happens to not just a small group of people but society,” said Dan Reidenberg, a mental health expert and executive director of Suicide Awareness Voices of Education. “Collective traumas are significant because they become transformative for a society.” - Rachel Thomasian, a licensed therapist and owner of Playa Vista Counseling The coronavirus pandemic is a clear example of collective trauma on a global scale, a shared experience of loss and serious emotional disturbance that has touched every citizen of the world in some way. “One way collective trauma differs from individual trauma is that while people tend to feel less ‘alone’ in the experience of collective trauma, they also tend to minimize the impact it has had on them by way of comparing themselves to those who have it ‘worse off.’” - Meg Gitlin, psychotherapist in New York “There is a benefit of feeling understood and validated when we experience an event with others, compared to the isolation that can come from experiencing an individual trauma,” Thomasian said. “One way collective trauma differs from individual trauma is that while people tend to feel less ‘alone’ in the experience of collective trauma, they also tend to minimize the impact it has had on them by way of comparing themselves to those who have it ‘worse off,’” Gitlin told HuffPost.