To warn or not to warn? Trigger warnings in arts, humanities and social sciences in UK HE

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Boyle, Karen and McCarry, Melanie and House, Melody (2025) To warn or not to warn? Trigger warnings in arts, humanities and social sciences in UK HE. Journal of Gender-Based Violence. ISSN 2398-6816 (https://doi.org/10.1332/23986808Y2025D000000081)

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Abstract

Although gender-based violence (GBV) in HE has received considerable attention recently, this has not, typically, extended to a concern with how experiences of GBV impact on student engagement with content about GBV. On the other hand, the emerging research evidence around trigger warnings in HE has not addressed GBV in a consistent way. This article thus aims to bring feminist work on GBV into the trigger warning debate. Drawing on our online survey of 525 teaching staff and focus groups with 42 staff and student-survivors of GBV, we argue for an epistemological shift that encourages a sharing of responsibility and an acknowledgment that there are survivors in all classrooms.

ORCID iDs

Boyle, Karen ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0162-2656, McCarry, Melanie ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4315-7035 and House, Melody ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3630-5917;
CORE (COnnecting REpositories)