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| Fig. 1: Three Mile Island Nuclear Plant (Source Wikimedia Commons) |
On March 28th, 1979 the Three Mile Island (TMI) Unit 2 reactor partially melted down near the town of Middletown, Pennsylvania (see Fig. 1). To date, this is most severe commercial nuclear power plant accident in U.S. History. [1] However, reports conducted by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission and several other U.S. and state departments, showed that no adverse effects from radiation on human, animal, and plant life could be directly correlated to the accident. [1] Before this was known, the Governor of Pennsylvania issued and advisory warning two days after the accident telling pregnant women and children under 5 within a 5-mile radius of TMI to evacuate. This resulted in more than 50,000 people being evacuated from their homes. [2] Psychologists in the years following were able study the emotional, behavioral, and physiological stress in the TMI residents as a result of the accident. Severe effects were found in both adults and children in the area.
In a study by Baum et al., TMI residents were compared with three different control groups of people who had either lived by undamaged nuclear power plants, traditional coal-fired power plants, or 20 miles from any power plant. [3] The key difference between these groups is that the TMI residents had undergone a "powerful environmental stressor" because of the accident and the other subjects had not. One of the self-report measures used confirmed the scientists prediction that the TMI residents reported higher levels of emotional distress than every one of the control groups. The Beck Depression Inventory also showed mean comparisons within the three control groups but statistically significant results showed the TMI residents were different. The same findings were shown in the task performance section of the study. For both an embedded-figures task and a proofreading task, "TMI subjects performance was significantly different from the three control groups" and they performed worse on both tasks. The most surprising of the findings was shown through urinary catecholamines. Both epinephrine and norepinephrine levels were significantly higher among the TMI residents than the levels of subjects living near undamaged nuclear and coal plants. [3]
These effects were not isolated to adults. In a study published in the Journal of the American Academy of Child Psychiatry, thirty-five local children and their parents were brought in a year-and-a-half after the accident to complete an open-ended interview about the accident, a structured interview of the subjects personal and medical history, and a series of standardized self-report measures. One of the most telling results, came from the Children's Manifest Anxiety Scale (CMAS). The CMAS is a 53-item, self report instrument designed to assess the level and nature of anxiety. Responses to each statement are recorded as either a "Yes" or "No" and a Total Anxiety score is computed from there. The mean anxiety score for these children was 18.00. CMAS results from another study of children who had not been impacted by a traumatic event found a mean score of 15.78. The same study compared these results by also looking at a "hospitalized emotionally disturbed group" and found their mean score to be 21.65. More than half of the TMI children had CMAS scores of 18 or higher - the "optimal" cutoff score. This study highlights a potential correlation that the TMI accident has spiked the average anxiety levels of children in the area. [4]
Although the TMI accident only resulted in small radioactive releases, the effects on the residents nearby cannot be downplayed. While physical health reports showed negative results, the psychophysiological impacts on TMI residents are significant. While living near a plant of any kind may cause a baseline level of stress, it is evident that living near a plant that has been damaged negatively impacts both adults and children in serious ways. In the future, the studies mentioned above as well as the many others like them, should prompt both state and national officials to offer psychological and psychiatric services to residents living near accident sights even if the adverse physical health effects are nil.
© Toni Adeyemi. The author warrants that the work is the author's own and that Stanford University provided no input other than typesetting and referencing guidelines. The author grants permission to copy, distribute and display this work in unaltered form, with attribution to the author, for noncommercial purposes only. All other rights, including commercial rights, are reserved to the author.
[1] J. G. Kemeny et al., "Report of the President's Commission on the Accident at Three Mile Island," U.S. Government Printing Office, October 1979.
[2] C. Hopkins, "Three Mile Island," Physics 241, Stanford University, Winter 2015.
[3] A. Baum, R. J. Gatchel, and M. A. Schaeffer, "Emotional, Behavioral, and Physiological Effects of Chronic Stress at Three Mile Island," J. Consult. Clin. Psych. 51, 565 (1983).
[4] H. A. Handford et al.. "Child and Parent Reaction to the Three Mile Island Nuclear Accident," J. Am. Acad. Child Psy. 26, 346 (1986).
