Aggression: Media influences - Effects of computer games Flashcards
Intro
Whatever form of media psychologists study, they do so using 3 basic methodologies - experimental studies (usually lab-based + look at short-term effects), correlational studies (can investigate real-life variables + may be short-term or may be longitudinal studies), meta-analysis (brings together the other 3 types to give an overall judgement of the size of the effect of violent media on aggressive behaviour.
Experimental studies
Lab study - Bartholow + Anderson - students played either a violent computer game (Mortal Kombat) or a nonviolent game (PGA Tournament Golf) for 10 minutes.
They all then carried out the Taylor Competitive Reaction Time Task, a standard lab measure of aggression where students delivered blasts of white noise at chosen volumes to punish a (non-existent opponent).
Those who played the violent game selected sig. higher noise levels compared with nonviolent players.
AO3 - Experimental studies
Strength - Allow us to establish a causal link between media aggression + aggressive behaviour.
Weakness - Measures of aggression in lab studies are often accused of being artificial + unrealistic such as the TCRTT which measures how much loud noise is selected. Although it would be unethical to allow realistic forms of aggression in an experiment (letting people hit each other). So researchers have no choice but to be creative in devising ways of measuring aggression.
Another reason why aggression measures in lab situations are unrealistic - they don’t involve any fear of retaliation. Unlike in real-life, experimenter gives participant implied permission to be ‘safely’ aggressive.
Correlational studies
DeLisi et al - studied 227 juvenile offenders, all with histories of serious aggressive behaviours (hitting a teacher or parent, gang fighting). Using structured interviews, gathered data on several measures of aggression + violent computer game-playing. Found that offenders’ aggressive behaviour was sig. correlated with with how often they played violent computer games + how much they enjoyed them.
The researchers argued that the link is so well-established that aggression should be considered a public health issue, like HIV/AIDS, + computer game violence a sig. risk factor, like condom non-use.
AO3 - Correlational studies
Strength - Allow us to investigate realistic forms of aggression (violent crime).
Weakness - Inability to draw cause-and-effect conclusions, no variables are manipulated or controlled, no random allocation of participants to violent or nonviolent conditions.
Positive correlation between viewing or playing of violent media + aggressive behaviour. This outcome doesn’t help us choose between 2 competing hypotheses of media effects:
Socialisation hypothesis - aggressive media causes people to become more aggressive.
Selection hypothesis - people who are already aggressive select aggressive media.
The direction of causality can’t be settled by correlational studies.
Longitudinal studies
Robertson et al - to see if there was a link between what they called ‘excesssive’ TV viewing in childhood + aggressive behaviour in adulthood. Studied 1037 people born in New Zealand in 1972 + 1973 + measured their TV viewing hours at regular intervals up to age of 26 years.
Found that time spent watching TV was a reliable predictor of aggressive behaviour in adulthood, measured in terms of convictions for aggressive + violent crimes. Those who watched most TV were more likely to be diagnosed with antisocial personality disorder + to have aggressive personality traits. It appears that the most important media-related factor in influencing aggressive behaviour may be the amount of TV watched rather than whether it has violent content or not.
AO3 - Longitudinal studies
Strength - To investigate changes in aggressive behaviour over time so the dynamic nature of media influences in the long term can be studied. Approach views people as active consumers rather than passive recipients which is a much more realistic view of how people interact with media.
Weakness - Studying change over time leaves longitudinal studies vulnerable to the effects of confounding variables. Many other sources of aggression interact with media influences over a period of time (role models in form of friends or family members). It becomes difficult to separate them all + assess their contributions to aggressive behaviour.
Meta-analysis
Anderson et al - meta-analysis of 136 studies which included all 3 types of methodology. Found that exposure to violent computer games was associated with increases in aggressive behaviours, thoughts + feelings. This finding was true for both males + females + across collectivist + individualist cultures. The higher quality studies in the analysis showed an even greater sig. effect. The researchers claim that the effect of violent game-playing on aggressive behaviour is greater than the effect of smoke on cancer. The analysis also showed no indication that publication bias influenced the results.
AO3 - Publication bias
Limitation - There is a well-known tendency in scientific research towards publishing only findings that are statistically sig. (sometimes called the file drawer problem as insignificant results get left in the filing cabinet). There is a problem for meta-analysis because they generally only include published studies so researchers may miss out on strong evidence to support their hypothesis.
