It is not surprising to find various depictions of physical violence when we turn on television. Many popular TV shows, movies, children’s programs, and video games frequently contain violent scenes such as attacks with a weapon, battles, or murders. Since media has become an essential part of our daily lives and are easily accessible through various devices for personal media consumption, there has been growing concern over the effects of media violence, which has led to extensive research and public attention. The vast majority of research studies consistently show that violent media negatively impacts viewers, making them likelier to increase their aggressive behavior (Bushman, Huesmann, & Whitaker, 2009). How do people become more aggressive by simply watching violent scenes on TV? Bandura (1986, 2009) argued that people learn to imitate violence through the media, which is called social cognitive theory. He introduced four processes that must occur in social cognitive theory: attention, representational, behavioral production, and motivational processes.
The first process indicated in Bandura’s model is attention. People must first pay attention to a specific behavior in order to imitate it. Which particular behaviors usually draw more attention? According to Bandura’s social cognitive theory, people are likely to pay attention to the modeled behaviors depending on how salient and attractive those behaviors are. Notably, violent behaviors portrayed in media, such as TV shows or movies, attract attention because they are usually thrilling, exciting, and salient. For example, violent scenes depicted in action movies, thrillers, and hero movies are popular, and many people find them exciting and fun to watch.
The second step is the representational process, which concerns the remembrance of specific behaviors. Even though these behaviors are exciting and attract attention, it is impossible to imitate them without actually remembering them. When certain behaviors are repeated multiple times, they are likely to be remembered or learned. For example, types of violence that appear more frequently in media become more familiar and likely to be recalled later for most individuals. People learn to imitate behaviors not only by repetition but also by mentally visualizing or rehearsing them, often through fantasies.
The third process outlined in Bandura’s social cognitive theory is the behavioral production process, in which people learn to perform the behaviors they have observed and remembered. This process involves learning to transform observed behaviors into more generalized or novel behaviors. Even though a person might mentally rehearse shooting someone he or she hates, they are unlikely to perform this action in real life. Instead, they are likelier to behave aggressively without actually harming the person whom they hate and to express their feelings in a more socially acceptable way.
Lastly, the final process of learning to imitate behaviors involves motivation. Even though people pay attention to, remember, and learn to perform behaviors into novel behaviors, they do not perform these behaviors if they are not sufficiently motivated. This can be explained by B. F. Skinner’s operant conditioning, which employs rewards and punishments for behavioral learning. This concept suggests that individuals are likely to become motivated to perform behaviors that are rewarded, while punishment discourages the performance of behaviors for which individuals are punished. This explains why people may not perform every type of behavior they see depicted in media; instead, they tend to perform the behaviors they are motivated to perform.
In sum, many research findings consistently support the negative impact of media violence on people. Potter (2003) found that TV violence increases short-term and long-term aggressive behaviors, the tendency to imitate violence, increased fear and desensitization to violence, and greater acceptance of violence. Bandura’s social cognitive theory explains how people actually learn to imitate observed violent behaviors by introducing four major processes: attention, representational, behavioral production, and motivational processes. This demonstrates that media violence can be learned by observation, but it does not mean that people learn to imitate all the behaviors they watch. Instead, people may learn to imitate behaviors that draw attention and are remembered, performed, and motivated to perform.
References
Bushman, B. J., Huesmann, L. R., & Whitaker, J. L. (2009). Violent media effects. In R. L. Nabi & M. B. Oliver (Eds.), The SAGE handbook of media processes and effects (pp. 361–376). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE
Bandura, A. (1986). Social foundations of thought and action: A social cognitive theory. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Bandura, A. (2009). Social cognitive theory of mass communication. In J. Bryant & M. B. Oliver (Eds.), Media effects: Advances in theory and research (3rd ed., pp. 94–124). New York, NY: Routledge
Potter, W. J. (2003). The 11 myths of media violence. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE
Staddon JE, Cerutti DT. Operant conditioning. Annu Rev Psychol. 2003;54:115-44. doi:10.1146/annurev.psych.54.101601.145124
Every parent these days states that violent games are the cause of all the school shoots and violence that is occurring in this world. For a long time, everyone just dismisses these statements. Finally, after many more instances of violence and school shootings we are starting to look a little bit closer to the correlation between violence in the media and in real life. Every video game you see in Walmart has some type of gun or gore on the front cover. Pre-teens and teen with developing brains are playing these games on a consistent basis and this desensitizes the effect of violence has on the brain. Potter (2003) found that TV violence increases short-term and long-term aggressive behaviors, the tendency to imitate violence, increased fear and desensitization to violence, and greater acceptance of violence.
References
Bushman, B. J., Huesmann, L. R., & Whitaker, J. L. (2009). Violent media effects. In R. L. Nabi & M. B. Oliver (Eds.), The SAGE handbook of media processes and effects (pp. 361–376). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE
Bandura, A. (1986). Social foundations of thought and action: A social cognitive theory. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Bandura, A. (2009). Social cognitive theory of mass communication. In J. Bryant & M. B. Oliver (Eds.), Media effects: Advances in theory and research (3rd ed., pp. 94–124). New York, NY: Routledge
Potter, W. J. (2003). The 11 myths of media violence. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE
Staddon JE, Cerutti DT. Operant conditioning. Annu Rev Psychol. 2003;54:115-44. doi:10.1146/annurev.psych.54.101601.145124
Hey there! This is an interesting blog post. I like how you wrote out Bandura’s steps in social cognitive theory related to media. It makes the post easy-to-follow, informative, and enjoyable to read.
It’s interesting to me that violence is such an essential part of media and television. We love it. We love stories that include and revolve around violence, yet we see the negative repercussion in society which is that it increases violence. It almost seems like there’s a fault in logic. Why can’t we consume media to enact our fantasies, instead of applying them to our own lives?
The third process in Bandura’s model is most interesting to me which is enacting behaviors. I think it’s interesting that although we witness violence and may even think extremely violent thoughts, we enact them differently. This makes sense, since humans must maintain peace and civilization. I believe this is a biologically built system. I wonder though if men and women enact violence differently. Most specifically, if a man and woman watch the same show, then need to confront their boss they hate, I wonder if they’ll approach their boss in a similar way. I am inclined to believe not. According to Archer and Coyne (2005), “over the last decade, researchers have found that girls may be just as aggressive as boys when manipulative forms of aggression, such as gossiping and spreading rumors, are included.” These are things to ponder and think about.
Overall, this is an awesome blog post! You got me thinking about media and how the human brain thinks, a fascinating and import topic. Thanks for this.
Reference
Archer, J., & Coyne, S. M. (2005). An Integrated Review of Indirect, Relational, and Social Aggression. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 9(3), 212–230. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15327957pspr0903_2
It is always very interesting to learn just how much and how often we are exposed to violence. We as a nation always talk about it but I am not sure we often truly realize all the effects it has on us and the influences and roles it manages to play.
Reference
Trickett, P.K., Durán, L. & Horn, J.L. Community Violence as It Affects Child Development: Issues of Definition. Clin Child Fam Psychol Rev 6, 223–236 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1023/B:CCFP.0000006290.91429.75
It is eye-opening to think about how much violence we are exposed to on a daily basis. Whether it be through our phones, on the tv, real news stories, or the fake stunts in a movie or show, violence seems to be everywhere. What I find interesting about the attention aspect of Bandura’s theory is how my attraction to violent media has changed over time. As a teenager, I used to love watching action movies and horror/thriller movies and shows. As you mentioned, it can provide feelings of excitement and thrill when watching intense fight scenes or other adrenaline-inducing media. This aligns with what Bandura predicts in his social cognitive theory. As I’ve gotten older though, I have stopped watching almost anything that includes violence as even fake violence displayed in shows and movies seems to trigger anxious feelings for me.
I certainly feel increased fear and, at the same time, desensitization to violence. I think this is largely due to the fact that I have become more aware of the news cycle as I have gotten older. Seeing real-life instances of violence every day has made me uncomfortable with a lot of violence within fictional media. However, I also feel desensitized to real violence as I don’t have a strong emotional response when listening to horrible things on the news anymore. Despite this, I still fear violence while being desensitized to the stories within the news cycle. To avoid the anxiety that the news and other violent media cause me, I have carefully curated my social media pages to avoid news and only turn the tv to news channels when I have the space for it. I have noticed a reduction in my feelings of violence-related fear since doing so, and it seems that my experiences have been validated by research studies.
There is an interesting study that examines the relationship between the news and feelings of fear/worry. They found that individuals who read the front pages of tabloids displayed more avoidance behaviors and were more worried about becoming a victim of violence. Along with this, the authors of this study reported that individuals are more likely to fear violence the more that they expose themselves to crime-based news (Smolej & Kivivuori, 2006). It is important to notice that this study was published 16 years ago though, and the media has changed a lot over this time. I am curious to know how media has affected the rate of fear of violence in more recent years. I imagine that the effects of violent media may have gotten worse with the invention and popularity of social media as social media sites make it easier than ever to access and view violent content.
Reference
Smolej, M., & Kivivuori, J. (2006). The relation between Crime News and fear of violence. Journal of Scandinavian Studies in Criminology and Crime Prevention, 7(2), 211–227. https://doi.org/10.1080/14043850601002429