Media Violence and Social Neuroscience New Questions and New Opportunities

Decades of research have demonstrated that exposure to violence on television can cause increases in aggression. The recent emergence of violent video games has raised new questions regarding the effects of violent media. The General Aggression Model (GAM) predicts that exposure to violent media increases aggressive behavior through one of three primary pathways (arousal, cognitions, and affect). Past psychophysiological research has supported GAM but has been limited to examining arousalrelated variables. Recent advances in social neuroscience have opened the door to investigations of exposure to violent media on cognitive and affective components and their neurocognitive underpinnings. Neuroscience tools have the potential to provide answers to the new questions posed by recent advances in media technology. KEYWORDS—aggression; brain imaging; fMRI; media violence; violent video games It is no secret that we are surrounded by electronic media. In a matter of years, through the development of the Internet, satellite television, cell phones, iPods, and video game systems, entertainment media have become more available than ever. As media technology has advanced, the amount of time that children and adolescents spend with it has increased. On average, American children now spend more than 5 hours a day consuming screen media (television, films, video games)—nearly as much time as they spend in school. Similar increases in media consumption have been reported in Europe and Asia. In addition, the most popular screen media consumed by children and adolescents contain considerable amounts of violence (Anderson et al., 2003). Such high levels of exposure to violent media in modern society have led to a combination of scientific intrigue and public concern. Although media technology is arguably causing changes in society at a faster pace than scientists can examine it, other technological advancements are benefiting the scientists’ cause. Recent developments in neuroscience have allowed scientists to understand the interaction between the psychological and physiological mechanisms like never before. This article reviews the findings of past research on violent media and explores how the development of violent video games presents social scientists with new empirical questions, as well as how developments in social neuroscience can provide novel approaches to address those questions. VIOLENT MEDIA EXPOSURE AND AGGRESSION Children’s exposure to violent media (e.g., television, movies, music, video games) has been a social concern for decades. For example, news reports linked Clint Eastwood’s ‘‘Dirty Harry’’ film character to copycat killings involving forced ingestion of Dr ano. More recently, violent video games have been linked to numerous school killings (e.g., Columbine High School) and other violent crime sprees (e.g., in California, Michigan, Minnesota, and Ohio). Most studies examining violent media have focused on the effects of violent television and movies on viewers’ aggression. The most recent comprehensive review of the effects of violent media found ‘‘unequivocal evidence that media violence increases the likelihood of aggressive and violent behavior in both immediate and long-term contexts’’ (Anderson et al., 2003, p. 81). Figure 1 (originally from the Anderson et al. review), shows that violent media are linked to increased aggression, regardless of the type of study design used to investigate its effects. Although comparably fewer studies have specifically focused on violent video games, existing research demonstrates that they also cause increases in aggressive behavior (e.g., Anderson et al., 2004). For example, one recent experiment (Anderson, Gentile, & Buckley, 2007) found that brief exposure to a violent children’s video game increased delivery of high-intensity noise Address correspondence to Nicholas L. Carnagey; e-mail: ncarnagey@ gmail.com. CURRENT DIRECTIONS IN PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCE 178 Volume 16—Number 4 Copyright r 2007 Association for Psychological Science blasts to an opponent by over 40%. This effect occurred for elementary school children and for college students. Beyond these basic findings, violent video games have presented scientists with a host of new questions. Video games are a qualitatively different form of media than television and film, primarily because video games are more interactive and immersive. Players of violent video games actually engage in virtual violent actions, receive direct rewards for those actions, closely identify with the characters they control, and actively rehearse aggressive behavioral scripts. GENERAL AGGRESSION MODEL There also are strong theoretical reasons to believe that exposure to violent media can increase aggression-related outcomes. The General Aggression Model (GAM; see Fig. 2) is an integration of several prior models of aggression (e.g., social learning theory, social cognitive theory, cognitive neoassociation, excitation transfer; see Anderson & Carnagey, 2004). Although GAM is not specifically a model of media effects, it is easily applied to this domain. Theoretically, violent media could affect one, two, or all three aspects of a person’s present internal state. Recent research has demonstrated that violent video games can temporarily increase aggressive thoughts, aggressive affect, and physiological arousal (e.g., Anderson et al., 2004), and can reduce arousal to subsequent depictions of violence (e.g., Carnagey, Anderson, & Bushman, 2007). Exposure to violent media can increase aggressive behavior by influencing any combination of these internal states. PHYSIOLOGICAL CONSEQUENCES OF MEDIAVIOLENCE EXPOSURE Media Violence and Arousal-Related Variables Media-violence researchers have long used physiological tools to better understand the relationship between violence exposure and aggression. Most of this research has focused on the potential effects of violent media on arousal. Numerous models have linked physiological arousal with human aggression. For example, excitation transfer theory (e.g., Zillmann, 1983) states that arousal elicited by external sources (e.g., exercise) may be misattributed as anger in situations involving provocation and may thereby increase the chances of producing anger-motivated aggressive behavior. Recent meta-analyses have demonstrated that playing violent video games can increase physiological arousal and anger (e.g., Anderson et al., 2004). Thus, one route by which playing violent video games can increase aggression is through increased physiological arousal. 0 0.05 0.1 0.15 0.2 0.25 0.3 Laboratory Field CrossSectional Longitudinal Experimental Studies Correlational Studies M ed ia V io le nc e E ffe ct o n A gg re ss io n Fig. 1. Effects of media violence on aggression for two types of experimental studies and two types of correlational studies. Effect sizes are presented in terms of r (correlation coefficient). Vertical capped bars indicate 95% confidence intervals. Because the bars do not include the zero line, the effect of media violence on aggression is statistically significant for each type of study. This figure originally appeared in Anderson et al. (2003). Person Situation Present Internal State Appraisal Decision Behavior Social Encounter Proximate Causes & Processes Environmental Modifiers Biological Modifiers