Effects Of Media On Agression Essay Research

Effects Of Media On Agression Essay, Research Paper

The Effects of the Media on Child Aggression Jasper Mills

According to our textbook Child Development written by Laura E. Burk child aggression is a normal and expected act consisting of things like threats, physical force, and bargaining without asking, this usually beginning in late infancy and peaks around preschool age and later. And the more a child interacts with another the greater chance that the child will express aggression in his or her behavior. Some forms of aggression tend to decline as the subject increases in age. As these children age these aggressive outbursts are seen as teaching opportunities for parents to use inductive reasoning so that children could learn the right way to express themselves and to solve certain disputes that they may encounter throughout their lifetime. The first six months of a child s life they not only begin to develop motor skills, but also begin to develop the mental ability needed in order to recognize traces of frustration and anger.

Burk in her writings describes four different types of aggression. Instrumental aggression is seen as being overt antisocial behavior expressed over a particular territory such as an object (a toy), or a space (children fighting over one be in the others room). This type of aggression declines as age increases and is meant to intimidate what is seen as the aggressor s adversary over such territory. This differing from hostile aggression which is described by Burk as clearly an aggressive act intended to blatantly hurt or harm another person and is the opposite of its counterpart in that it increases with age. From hostile aggression stems overt aggression, defined as harming others through acts of physical violence, beating up or threatening to beat up another person, most commonly found in male children. Another type of aggression, which stems from hostile aggression but on the other hand is more commonly found in female children, is relational aggression. Relational aggression is defined as being a type of aggression, which challenges ones social relations with others, such as gossip or even social neglect of that person.

Heath ET el. in her article, Effects of Media Violence on Children attempt to explain to the reader her theory that certain television programs induce aggression in children. In her quasilongitudinal study examined convicted criminals versus suburban men who grew up in the same neighborhood. Subjects were supplied with T.V Guide summary sheets and asked to list the television show that they most frequently watched between the ages of 8 and 12 years. Heath measured her results in three separate categories, the witnessing of physical abuse by the father, physical abuse by the mother, and exposure to violence on television. Those who witnessed two out of three of these categories were most likely to have been convicted of a violent crime.

Heath suggested that the witnessing and memorization of violence in the home may alter and enhanced the way one memorized certain television images. Heath also claims that the media depicts to us our fears about particular people and places in our society. For example, because the news depicts Hamilton Hill as being a very dangerous place, many people are now afraid to even drive through this area. Heath also suggests that children who have witnessed violence in the home versus those who have not may interpret violent media messages on different television stations. For example, while children who were raised in nonviolent homes may view media violence through fictional programs such as cartoons or horror movies. Children who have experienced violence in their home may interpret violence through more nonfiction or real life programs such as the news or some kind of documentary. In instances where a child s real life home situations imitated those, which they viewed on television, the probability of that boy or girl expressing child aggression was much higher.

A study conducted by Jonathan L.Freedman entitled Television Violence and Aggression: A Rejoinder has mixed reviews on the hypothesis that the viewing of television violence causes later aggression in children. However, he claims that studies conducted thus far of this hypothesis have in his opinion no reliability claiming that only a vast number of studies have observed the actual aggression, which is being predicted. Freedman suggested that you use (as in the study conducted by (Friedrich & Stein 1973) two groups, a group consistently watching high levels of television violence projected to steadily increase in aggression versus those watching a neutral amount of television violence projecting aggressiveness to steadily decrease. Freedman concludes that no definite solution could be given as a result of the evidence showing traces of favor to both sides of the argument.

My operational definition of the term aggression is any verbal or physical expression either prosocial or antisocial used to either harm or cause a reaction out of another. The hypothesis of this study is that child aggression is invoked if not equally than more so through child animation films as it is are in live action movies geared toward the younger audience. Through this study I intend to prove this hypothesis through a systematic rating system of both these types of films. This topic is important because if proven