PSYCHOLOGY MASTER'S THESIS ABSTRACT

Tamara Lynn Calvillo

MA-Research
December 2002

Differential Effects of Television and Video Game Violence on Aggressive Behavior

    The media have endured an onslaught of moral attacks concerning overproduction and distribution of violence.  But which medium is capable of having the most significant impact on our society?  Video games, as opposed to television, require active participation, which has been shown to produce more in-depth learning and greater retention.  Yet, television has been the primary focus of psychological research and comparatively little attention has been paid to the effects of video games.  The present study examined the amount of aggressive behavior elicited by two different forms of media violence, video games versus television.  A sample of 26 male and 26 female undergraduates were recruited to participate.  Subjects were divided by gender and assigned to one of two conditions in which either a television program was observed or a video game was played.  Aggressive behavior was measured by means of performance ratings of a confederate; the evaluations varied from 1 (positive) to 6 (negative).  Negative evaluations were taken as indicating aggression.  Trait aggression was also measured, by means of a self-report questionnaire, and treated as a covariate for the primary analyses.  A 2 (media type) x 2 (gender) between subjects analysis of covariance revealed no significant interaction and no main effect for media type, but a significant main effect for gender (p < .05), such that males responded more aggressively than females.  Post-hoc analyses provided a more detailed examination of gender effects, showing that males were more aggressive overall, but were also more experienced with video games.  Perhaps experience-level is, therefore, a variable to be controlled in future research.  Other implications of the current research for future studies of media and violence are discussed.

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