Marios Avraamides

Desensitization to media violence over a short period of time

Publisher: Wiley

Date: 03-2009

DOI: 10.1002/AB.20295

Abstract: This study investigated the desensitization to violence over a short period of time. Participants watched nine violent movie scenes and nine comedy scenes, and reported whether they enjoyed the violent or comedy scenes and whether they felt sympathetic toward the victim of violence. Using latent growth modeling, analyses were carried out to investigate how participants responded to the different scenes across time. The findings of this study suggested that repeated exposure to media violence reduces the psychological impact of media violence in the short term, therefore desensitizing viewers to media violence. As a result, viewers tended to feel less sympathetic toward the victims of violence and actually enjoy more the violence portrayed in the media. Additionally, desensitization to media violence was better represented by a curvilinear pattern, whereas desensitization to comedy scenes was better represented by a linear pattern. Finally, trait aggression was not related to the pattern of change over time, although significant effects were found for initial reports of enjoyment and sympathy.

The University Of Texas At Austin

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University Of California Santa Barbara

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Pennsylvania State University University Park

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Max-Planck-Campus Tubingen

Location: Germany

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