Everybody's scared--but life goes on: coping, defense and action in the face of nuclear threat

Studies of response to nuclear threat have produced several "typologies" of coping and defense mechanisms. In this paper, a model of the sequence of processes by which people deal with recurrent fears about nuclear war is proposed, drawing on risk perception and stress paradigms. It is shown how the accumulated data can be interpreted in terms of appraisal processes and schemata, and that "activism" is but one coping mechanism rather than the logical outcome of effective coping. The implications for psychologists concerned about the nuclear threat are considered.