The Impact of Television Violence | The Impact of Television Violence

Children watch more television on average than other age groups. These days, it can be said that children are being raised and educated more by TV than they are by their parents. It is important to think about what sort of impact TV is having on the most impressionable part of society, the children, by playing such a prominent role in their lives.

In the US, there are around 188 hours of violent programs per week. 81% of programs contain violence1 More than 50% of music videos contain violence, and children are often exposed to this when they want to watch the videos with their favorite singers in them etc. Since violence is so heavily featured on TV, children who are highly exposed to such programs "may exhibit a relatively high incidence of hostility themselves in imitation of the aggression they have witnessed.2

Albert Bandura was a psychologist whose studies have given us much more insight into social and observational learning. Bandura's most famous experiment, the Bobo doll study, raised some interesting questions about the importance of these types of learning. In his experiment, Bandura showed two groups of children a film. The first group was shown a film of an adult beating up a Bobo doll. The second group (the control group) was shown a film with no violence in it. When Bandura allowed the two groups access to the Bobo doll, he found that the group that had watched the Bobo film displayed much more aggression than the control group. Bandura's work demonstrated the importance of social learning for children.

Much of what children learn is the result of observational learning, an important factor in social learning. Children observe and pattern behavior after that of the important people in their lives.3 Now that television plays such a big role in the lives of children it is important to understand that it may be an even more important model than their parents. By exploring the three ways that modeling can influence the observer, the potential impact of TV violence upon children can be seen.

Television may serve as a model for observational learning. Bandura suggested that modeling influences the observer in three different ways4: learning new responses, inhibition and disinhibition, and facilitation.

Learning new responses: Children are able to learn new patterns of behavior by watching the behavior of others. When TV characters respond to situations using violence or types of violence which are novel to children, they may try to imitate that response.

Inhibition and disinhibition: When TV characters engaging in forms of violence do not experience any negative consequences as a result of their actions, this may encourage children to behave in the same way. In this way, behaviors which were previously inhibited may become disinhibited when children observe models.

Facilitation occurs when a response that children wouldn't usually make becomes more probable. 5When children see TV characters engaging in behavior that they are capable of but wouldn't normally engage it, they may see this behavior as appropriate and then recall and apply it to similar situations.

The impact of TV violence upon society is not only a theory. A number of deaths have been linked to TV violence. John Hinckley attempted to assassinate President Ronald Reagen after he watched the movie "Taxi Driver" fifteen times. Ronald Zamora brutally slaughtered an elderly woman and pleaded insanity. His attorney argued that Zamora was addicted to TV violence, and as a result was unable to differentiate between fantasy and reality.

Researcher William Benson found that adolescents who watched excessive amounts of television during their childhood and development became adult criminals. He stated that they committed violent crimes such as rape and assault, "at a rate 49% higher than teenage boys who had watched below average quantities of television violence6

A wealth of evidence to suggest the impact of TV violence upon society should surely be enough to elicit a reduction in it. Just as TV and its impact upon observational learning can be blamed for the increase in violence, it could also be used as a tool to reduce it. By omitting the majority of violent acts shown on television it is probable that violent acts among our society would also be lowered. If TV has become a model for children's behavior, its status as a model could also be used in a productive way. Rather than TV characters solving their problems by resulting to violence or violent acts, programs could show problems being solved using discussion and communication. Children could then be shown, through observational learning, new and more appropriate ways to deal with situations. The gratuitous violence that has now become commonplace could be stopped, or at least changed to implied violence and used only when it is absolutely necessary to plot development.

Rather than characters on television getting away with violent acts, a representation of the magnitude of these acts could be communicated to viewers by showing those who commit crimes being apprehended and punished in ways proportionate to their crimes, just as they would in real life.

Television could be used to lower violent crime in society by illustrating that such acts are not acceptable. By replacing society's habituation to violence with an inhibition towards it, television channels and companies could begin a shift in attitudes and actions. This shift would become easily apparent as the youth of today grew and came to realize that violence is not always the answer.