Does exposure to media violence increase an individual's likelihood of engaging in violent behaviour?

Source

Aim/Hypotheses

Participants

Method

Results

Conclusions/Limitations

Krahe, B., &

Moller Ingrid, L.
Rowell Huesmann
(2011).
Desensitization to
media violence:
Links with habitual
media violence
exposure,
aggressive
cognitions, and
aggressive behavior.
Journal of
Personality and
Social Psychology,
100(4), 630-646.

To investigate
the role of emotional
desensitization to depictions of
violence as a potential variable in
the link between media violence
and aggression.

Students at the university of

Postdam, Germany.
303 participants (215 men and 88
women) participated in both parts
of the experiment. The mean age
was 23.75 years.

The study was completed in two

parts. The first part was an online
questionnaire using a likert scale of
frequency using certain types of
media and genre. 21 random
undergraduates ranked the genres in
levels of violence, and this scale was
used to determine the most violent
genres.
The second part was the laboratory
experiment.
Participants were shown a violent,
sad and funny clip and their SCL was
recorded, as well as a self-report of
their perceptions on the film clips.
Participants were given a lexical
decision task to measure accessibility
of aggressive thoughts, and the noise
blast paradigm for aggressive
behaviour.

Media violence exposure

correlated positively with trait
aggression in both genders, with
pleasant arousal to the violent clip,
and with more rapid recognition of
aggressive words in the lexical
decisions task. Trait aggression was
linked to beliefs accepting
aggression, and trait arousability
showed a positive correlation with
anxious arousal elicited by the
violence exposure was unrelated to
aggression on the competitive
reaction time task.

The findings suggest that the more

individuals habitually used violent
media contents, the less physiological
reactivity they showed to a violent film
clip presented to them in a laboratory
setting.
Physiological responses
reflecting the intensity of arousal turned
out to be unrelated to subsequent
aggressive cognitions and behaviour.

Gentile, D. A., &

Bushman, B. J.
(2012). Reassessing
media violence
effects using a risk
and resilience
approach to
understanding
aggression..
Psychology of
Popular Media
Culture, 1(3), 138-

To investigate the effect of violent

media, considering multiple
factors that may facilitate or
inhibit aggression, through a risk
and resilience framework.

Children and teachers were surveyed

at the beginning of the experiment,
and then 6 months afterward.
Physical aggression was measured
using self-reports (whether they had
been in a fight), peer-nominations,
and teacher-reports (on a likert scale).
All forms of report were used to
create a composite measure of
aggression. Hostile attribution bias
was measured with a scenario based
instrument.

Viewing and/or use of violent

media explained 8.1% of the
variance in the composite
Measure of aggression at the 6
month period, when other factors
were controlled. Decreased levels
of violence were found in
participants whose parents
monitored their watch/use of
violent media.

The results imply that

exposure to media violence is
associated with
Increased risk of later aggression, but
that the aggression may be reduced
through protective factors such as
parental supervision.

The more media violence

individuals have been exposed to,
the less increase in physiological
arousal they will show to a
violent film clip. Lower anxious
arousal and greater pleasant
arousal to the violent film clip but
not to the sad or funny clips
should be linked to increased
accessibility of aggressive. The
higher the pleasant in response to
violence, the more
rapid will the accessibility of
aggressive cognitions.

The presence of any individual

risk factor would predict
aggression occurring during the 6
month period, even after
controlling for aggression at the
beginning of the experiment and

430 children (51% male, 49%

female) participated, with an
average age of 9.7 years. The
children were 86% Caucasian, as
represented of the Minnesota area
the study was conducted in. The
participants came from a diverse
range of Minnesota schools
private, public and rural.

Participant were offered money/credit

for participation, this is coercion and
may cause limit to generalisation.
The study does not determine a link
between media and real life violence,
the laboratory experiment lacks
ecological validity.

There are several limitations to the

study. The self-reporting of fights does
not specify whether the participant was
the instigator or the victim, and thus

151.

total screen time for TV, videos

and video games.

Ferguson,
C.J. (2011). Video
games and youth
violence: A
prospective analysis
in
adolescents. Jounal
of Youth and
Adolescence, 40(4).
377-391.

To investigate he potential
negative effects of violent video
games on adolescent antisocial
behaviour and youth violence
The frequency of exposure to
violent content in
video games will predict serious
aggressive behaviour across
outcome measures 12 months
later once third variables have
been controlled. Aggression level
will be predictive of video games
exposure.

Participants listed favourite media

and how often they used/watched
them. The participants also reported
on how often parents observed them
while playing/watching the violence.

302 (52.3% female) participants,

almost entirely (96.8%) Hispanic.
All between the ages of 10 and
14.
Recruited from a prior study of
youth violence and found through
snowball sampling.

Reports were taken at the beginning

of the experiment and then 12 months
after.
Parent and youth
Likert scale reports were used to test
aggression. Participants were asked to
rank their favourite shows/video
games and how often they watch/play
them. Shows/games were then ranked
for violence using the Entertainment
Software Ratings Board (ESRB).
The Negative life Events
instrument and the Family
environment Scale were used to
determine environmental influence.
The withdrawal scale of the Child
Behavior Checklist Youth Self-Report
was used to determine levels of
depression.

First report: 75% reported playing

video games within the past month,
40% reporting that the games were
violent.
12 Months later: 7% reported
engaging in a violent criminal
offense. 19% reported in a nonviolent crime.
Video game violence exposure was
not correlated with age or
aggressiveness of the child, nor did
the amount of video games played
correlate affect aggressiveness.

cannot be accurately used as a measure

for aggression. While Child consent
was 100%, only over 70% is indicated
of parental consent, which may be
considered unethical.
There was a lack of environmental
control, and therefore does not have the
causality of a laboratory experiment,
nor the reliability of monitoring
parental influence.
Levels of
Depressive symptoms were found to be
a strong predictor for serious
aggression. However, no evidence was
found to support the hypotheses of a
long term effect of violent video game
exposure on aggression and/or youth
violence.
As the participants were almost entirely
(96.8%) Hispanic, the results may not
be generalizable to people of different
race/cultures.
44% of participants that initially
completed the experiment did not give
results after the 12 month period;
results could be confounded if
participants with violent behaviour
were more likely to drop out of the
study.