Despite the prevalence of gun violence in the United States, gun violence research has been largely curtailed by the 1996 Dickey Amendment—a bill that prohibited federal funding to be used on gun violence research. Additionally, existing research on the impacts of gun violence has focused on single outcomes in disparate domains (e.g., health, economy), hindering our ability to estimate its total impact. Life satisfaction may offer a solution, allowing individuals to evaluate how their lives are going overall. This study examined the impact of individual-level and largely indirect population-level gun violence on life satisfaction using U.S. General Social Survey and Gallup Sharecare Well-being Index data (N = 40,949). Being a direct victim of gun violence predicted lower life satisfaction, whereas indirect exposure to gun violence through mass shootings had little effect on life satisfaction but coincided with experiences of negative affect. This demonstrates the level at which policymakers could effectively intervene to alleviate the downstream consequences of gun violence.
Chan et al. (Thu,) studied this question.