EFFECTS OF TV VIOLENCE:

BEHAVIORAL, COGNITIVE
& EMOTIONAL
BY MALEEHA HASHMI
HISTORICAL BACKGROUND

• Payne Fund Studies

• Movies eroding moral standards?
• Found sex & crime scenes against moral values
• No conclusive evidence was emerged
THE SEDUCTION OF THE INNOCENT
1954
• By American psychiatrist Fredric Wertham
• Comic books were serious cause of juvenile
delinquency
• Distorting view of the world
• Significant correlation between crime comics reading
and the more serious form of juvenile delinquency
 THE SURGEON GENERAL’S REPORT
• John F. Kennedy (1963), Malcolm X (1965), Martin Luther King , Jr (1968) and Robert Kennedy (1968)

• Committee formed in 1969

• Published report consist of 5 volumes & 1 summary report

• Conclusion drawn were:
1. Television content is heavily saturated with violence
2. Children & adults spending more and more time in front of tv
3. Violent television entertainment increases the likelihood of aggressive behavior among
viewers
EFFECTS OF TV VIOLENCE

• TV violence may have impact on viewers at number of

psychological levels
1. Behavioral
2. Cognitive
3. Emotional
 BEHAVIORAL EFFECTS

• Behavioral effects of TV violence have been hypothesized to act via number of

principals including
• Catharsis
• Arousal
• Disinhibition
• Imitation
• Desensitization
CATHARSIS
• Assumes that accumulated aggressive impulses can be
discharged by individuals if they become absorbed in violent
events
• Idea came from studies done by Seymour Feshbach in 1984
• Demonstrated discharge aggressive impulses through two ways:
1. Through fantasy
2. Through watching fictional portrayals
EXPERIMENTAL RESEARCH BY FESHBACH

• Teenage boys were observed for 6 weeks.

• TV viewing diet manipulated to control the amount of
violence
• Boy who watched mainly nonviolent content were
found as more aggressive than those who watched
violent content
 AROUSAL
• Tannenbaum & Zillmann in 1975
• Non-specific psychological response, which is defined by the
type of material being watched
• Violence arouse viewers and make them excited
• Sexual and humorous content may have same effects
• Delay in opportunity to respond helps in reducing aggression
 DISINHIBITION
• Researches done in 80s by Donnerstein, Malamuth on violent
pornographic media content
• Watching violence may legitimize the use of violence by the
viewer in real life
• Researchers found in laboratory conditions that violent
response is specially likely to occur if viewers were already
angry
EXAMPLES OF DISINHIBITION

• Columbine Tragedy 1999

• 2 teenage boys murdered 12 schoolmates and a teacher and
injured 21 others before taking their own lives.
• Their lives centered around violent video games
• Seung-Hui Cho, a student who in 2007 shot to death 32
students and faculty of Virginia Tech, wounded 17 more, and
then killed himself.
RESEARCH ON DISINHIBITION EFFECT

• Ohio State University in 2017

• A 2010 review by psychologist Craig A. Anderson concluded that “ the
exposure to violent video games is a causal risk factor for increased
aggressive behavior, aggressive cognition, and aggressive affects
• 8- to 12-year-old children were showed a 20-minute version of a popular
PG-rated movie “ Rocketeer” or National Treasure.
• Children were sent to a room that contained various toys including Legos,
nerf guns, and games
CONTD.

• The children who watched the movie with the guns played more
aggressively
• The playroom also contained a closed cabinet, where in one of the
drawers was a real 0.38-caliber handgun
• 83 percent of the kids found the gun, and most of them played with it.
• Only 27 % immediately returned it to the experimenters
• Importantly, almost none of the kids who watched the movie clip without
guns ever pulled the trigger.
IMITATION

• Assumes that tv viewers specially young ones inclined

to learn behavior from TV characters
• Albert Bandura’s series of experiments done BOBO
doll
DESENSITIZATION

• Repeated viewing leads to reduction in emotional

responsiveness to violence
• Increases acceptance of violence
• Drabman & Thomas 1974 checked the response of 8 years old
during fight
• Children who watched violent material were less likely to seek
help of adults
COGNITIVE EFFECTS

• Cognitive effects are those which are likely to influence

and shape beliefs and opinion about the world
• Major contributor was George Gerbener, professor at
University of Pennsylvania
• Raised the issue and decided to research
• Research findings were based on secondary analyses of
National public opinion survey data in US
CULTIVATION ANALYSIS :
RESEARCH FINDINGS

• Amount of TV viewing was correlated with beliefs they had

about the world
• Exaggerated impression of the extent of threat & excessive
anxiety about personal safety
• Mean-world syndrome
• Research was modified after criticism
LEVELS OF JUDGEMENT

• Categorization of relationship between watching

violence and its effects on cognition
• In 1979 Doob & Macdonald replicated the study in
Canada
• Found the gathered data as evidence of spuriousness of
relationship between tv viewing and fear of crime
 CONTD.

1) Program specific :
Evidences were found in 1986 by Weaver & Wakshlag.
Influence of TV may not relate to total amount of time
It is linked to the amount watched on TV about relevant content such as crime
2) Viewer’s perception:
Interpretation of the content
Example : crime petrol
New Jack city, Boulevard nights, walk proud
CONTD.

3) People’s Judgement
The idea was presented by Tyler in1984
(i) Societal level : General beliefs about the frequency of crime
Example : Karachi
(ii) Personal Judgement: Personal judgement, beliefs about
personal vulnerability
It may vary from person to person
4) Situation Specific
It may not be the same from one setting to the next
Example: moving in public vs private transport
EMOTIONAL EFFECTS

• Television can produce both weak & very pronounced

emotional response
• TV may have immediate effects as well as long term
relationships between exposure and cultivation of fearfulness
• Major studies done bey Cantor ;main focus was children ; age
bracket was 3-11 years
CONTD.

• Children were observed during watching frightening tv

programs/clips/films
• Observations were made through questions, small sensors & facial
expressions
FINDINGS:
• Young ones were frightened by appearance like hulk etc
• With maturity source of fear shifted towards abstract threats & realistic
fears like snake etc
COGNITIVE/NONCOGNITIVE STRATEGIES

Noncognitive strategy :
• Desensitization through gradual, repeated exposure to frightening
stimulus

Cognitive strategy :
• Requires children to think about fear stimulus.
• Worked more in matured ones as children need to
comprehend the info prior and during the exposure to the
frightening stimulus
 RESEARCHES

• THE ROLE OF MEDIA VIOLENCE IN VIOLENT BEHAVIOR by US professors L. Rowell

Huesmann and Laramie D. Taylor
• Annual Review of Public Health ,2006
• Research shows that fictional television and film violence contribute to both a short-term and a
long-term increase in aggression and violence in young viewers.
• Television news violence also contributes to increased violence, principally in the form of imitative
suicides and acts of aggression.
• The relationship between media violence and real-world violence and aggression is moderated by
the nature of the media content and characteristics of and social influences on the individual
exposed to that content
• Freedman, 2002; Olson, 2004; Savage, 2004 have pointed out
that as media content has increased in violence in the past few
decades, violent crimes among youth have declined rapidly.
• Because the violence being portrayed in media especially TV is
usually punished, it does not have an effect on producing violent
behavior