PSY220H1 Lecture Notes - Lecture 8: Observational Learning, Longitudinal Study, Cognitive Model
The General Aggression Model (social cognitive model --- on slides)
So it looks at the person his situation, previous social encounters. Routes to arousal like
cognition, affect, and arousal. And the outcomes. (the exact description is in audio recording).
Does Violent Media Cause Aggression?
•Association vs. causal claims–We can’t randomly assign children to watch different types (or
amounts) of violent TV over the course of their childhood•What can we do?–Longitudinal
studies (correlational)–Laboratory Experiments
The general consensus is that there is a link here (I’m skeptical but okay)
Huesmann et al., 2003:•Examined relations between TV-violence viewing at ages 6-10 and
adult aggressive behaviour 15 years later–Sample consisted of children who grew up in the
1970s & 1980s–Measured many different variables (incl. many potential “third variables”)–
Adult aggression measure: Self-reports, other person reports, & archival state data (arrests,
convictions, traffic violations)
•Key Findings:–Childhood exposure to media violence predicts young adult aggressive
behavior for both males and females
–Identification with aggressive TV characters, as well as the perceived realism of TV violence,
also predict later aggression–These relations persist even when other variables such as
socioeconomic status, intelligence, and parenting factors (e.g., parental aggression, parenting
practices, etc.) are statistically controlled
This was the first longitudinal study that included females as well as males. (graphs on slides)
Does watching violent/aggressive behavior cause people to act more aggressively?
•Konijn et al., 2007–Notes that video games have gotten a lot more realistic over the years–
Predict that this will make it easier to identify with the characters, and that stronger identification
with the characters will lead to increased increase in aggressive behavior
•Konijn et al., 2007–Participants were adolescent boys (about 13 who were at risk for violence,
low education conditioned)–Randomly assigned to 1 of 4 video game conditions: (all pre-
screened to be equally enjoyable) •Violent fantasy•Violent realistic•Non-violent
fantasy•Non-violent realistic
–Played for 20 minutes, then engaged in a competitive task with a partner whom they could blast
with a harmful noise if they lost (its rigged so they get to be the first person to blast)
–DV: What level did they set the noise at for the first trial? (unprovoked blast)They are told that
level 8 and above can cause hearing damage (don’t actually get blast) ---- (results on chart)
So in violent games where there is strong identification with the characters they blast above 8
unprovoked. Qualitative feedback from the children appeared to support this hypothesis.
•New study just published (Nov 2017) in JAMA examined the immediate effects of exposure to
movie characters with guns on children’s (8-12yr olds) unsupervised play with guns•Children
who viewed a PG-rated movie containing guns played with a real gun longer and pulled the
trigger more times (mdn = .01 vs. 2.8) than did children who viewed the same movie not
containing guns
What about exposure to non-physical (indirect) aggression?
Document Summary
The general aggression model (social cognitive model --- on slides) So it looks at the person his situation, previous social encounters. Routes to arousal like cognition, affect, and arousal. And the outcomes. (the exact description is in audio recording). The general consensus is that there is a link here (i"m skeptical but okay) Huesmann et al. , 2003: examined relations between tv-violence viewing at ages 6-10 and adult aggressive behaviour 15 years later sample consisted of children who grew up in the. 1970s & 1980s measured many different variables (incl. many potential third variables ) . Adult aggression measure: self-reports, other person reports, & archival state data (arrests, convictions, traffic violations: key findings: childhood exposure to media violence predicts young adult aggressive behavior for both males and females. This was the first longitudinal study that included females as well as males. (graphs on slides)
