Viewing TV Violence in the U.S.

The two major theories concerning television aggression are frustration-aggression and social learning; each theory makes different predictions about the effects of television violence. The frustration-aggressive theory suggests that viewing an aggressive act will lessen the instigation toward future aggression. If children vicariously experience aggression by watching violence on TV, they should therefore be less likely to aggress. Social learning theory, on the other hand, suggests that witnessed aggression leads to more aggression rather than to catharsis (Worchel, et al, 1990).

Social psychology, therefore, views the question of the effects of television violence on children as a testable problem, based, for example, on cause and effect, or the analysis of the relationships between variables:

For example, in an experiment testing the effects of TV violence on children's aggression we might show some children a violent TV show and others a nonviolent show (the violence of the show would constitute the independent variable) and then observe whether the two kinds of programs have any effect on the children's aggressiveness (the dependent variable) (Lippa, 1990, 30).

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is a dominant factor even in programming for children. The AACAP reports that Hundreds of studies of the effects of TV violence on children and teenagers have found that children may: become "immune" to the horror of violence; gradually accept violence as a way to solve problems; imitate the violence they observe on television; and identify with certain characters, victims and/or victimizers ("Children," 2000). The same study shows that "watching a single violent program can increase aggressiveness." In addition, the more realistic the violence, the greater the frequency, and the degree to which it goes unpunished, are all factors increasing the likelihood that the child viewer will "imitate what they see" ("Children," 2000). The National Television Violence Study of the University of Texas at Austin College of Communication "finds TV violence continues to pose a serious risk of harm to children." Particularly alarming is the fact that there is a "rise in the level of visual violence in the late afternoon" (National, 1998, 2), a time when child viewing is high. The UCLA Television Violence Report, 1997, provides a wealth of evidence for increased TV violence and its negative effect on children, focusing not only on
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Approximate Word count = 1672
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page)

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