Desensitisation, disinhibition and cognitive priming

Role of desensitisation

• Desensitisation is reduced sensitivity to a stimulus

• Normally when we witness violent crimes/actions we experience psychological arousal associated with the sympathetic nervous system such as increased heart rate/breathing rate, sweating…

• But when children repeatedly view aggression on TV or play violent games they become used to its effect. So a stimulus that is usually aversive has a lesser impact, so anxiety and arousal become lower on repeated viewing or playing

• This desensitisation is psychological as well as biological

• Repeated exposure to violent media promotes the belief that using aggression is a method of resolving conflict. Negative attitudes towards violence weaken, less empathy is spelt for victims and their injuries are minimised and dismissed

• Lab experiment which heighten these desensitisation effects was conducted by Weisz and Earls

• They showed the participants a film called Straw Dogs which contains a prolonged and graphic scene of rape

• Participants, then watched a re-enactment of a rape trial

• Compared to those who watched a non-sexually violent film, male viewers of straw dogs showed greater acceptance of rape myths and sexual aggression. They also experienced less sympathy towards the victim in the trial and were less likely to find the defendant guilty.

• There was no such affect of film type female participants

Strength

• One strength of the desensitisation explanation is research support - Karhe showed participants violent and non-violent films while measuring physiological arousal using skin conductance. But participants who were habitual viewers of violent media showed lower levels of arousal as they watched the violent film clips. They also gave the best of white noise to a Confederate without being provoked. This lower arousal in violent media users reflects desensitisation to the effects of violence, and it was also linked to greater willingness to be aggressive

Limitations

• One limitation is that desensitisation cannot explain some aggression - the study by Krahe fails to link media viewing , lower arousal and provoked aggression. A more valid explanation for this might be catharsis. The psychodynamic theory suggests that violent media is a safety valve, allowing people to release aggressive impulses about behaving violently. Therefore, not all aggression is a result of desensitisation and alternative explanations may be more valid.

• The theory is environmentally deterministic, as it suggests that repeated exposure to violence will automatically lead to reduced emotional responsiveness and increased aggression. This overlooks individual differences, as not everyone exposed to violent media becomes desensitised or behaves aggressively. People can critically evaluate what they see and regulate their responses, meaning behaviour is not entirely determined by exposure.

Role of disinhibition

• Disinhibition is a lack of restraint

• Most people generally hold the view that violence and aggression are antisocial and harmful. So there are strong social and psychological inhibitions against using aggression to resolve conflict

• According to the disinhibition explanation, these usual restraints are loosened after exposure to violent media

• Aggressive behaviour is often made to appear normative and socially sanctioned in social media

• Video games show violence being rewarded while consequences are minimised and ignored. This creates new social norms in the viewer.

Strength

• One strength of the disinhibition explanation is research support - Berkowitz and Alioto found that participants who saw a film depicting aggression as vengeance gave more electric shocks of longer duration to a confederate. Media violence made this inhibit aggressive behaviour if it is presented as justified and socially acceptable, as in the case of vengeance. This demonstrates the link between removal of social constraints and subsequent aggressive behaviour.

• Another strength of disinhibition is that it can explain the effects of cartoon violence - children do not learn specific aggressive behaviours from cartoon models. Instead they learn that aggression in general is acceptable and socially normative. This is especially true if the cartoon model is not punished. This inhibits aggressive behaviour. Therefore disinhibition explains how aggression can lead to aggression in those who observe it

Limitations

• The explanation is environmentally deterministic, as it suggests that exposure to aggressive models will automatically reduce inhibitions and lead to aggressive behaviour. This ignores individual differences and free will, as not everyone exposed to media violence becomes aggressive. Many people can watch violent content without imitating it, which challenges the deterministic nature of the theory.

Role of cognitive priming

• Repeated viewing of aggressive media, especially gameplay can provide us with a script about how violent situations may play out

• According to Heusman, this script is stored in memory so we become ready or primed to be aggressive

• The process is mostly automatic, directing our behaviour without us even being aware of it. The script is triggered when we encounter cues in a situation that we perceive as aggressive.

• A study by Fischer and Greitemeyer illustrates the priming of aggressive scripts . They investigated a neglected form of media violence - song lyrics

• Men listened to songs featuring aggressive, derogatory lyrics about women. Compared to when they listen to more neutral lyrics, participants record more negative qualities about women and behaved more aggressively towards a female confederate.

• This procedure was replicated with women as participants listening to ‘men hating’ song lyrics, the results were similar

Strength

• One strength of cognitive priming is its real world applications - whether real world situations become violent often depends on how people interpret environmental queues. This in turn depends on the cognitive scripts they have stored in memory. Bushman and Anderson argue that someone who habitually watches violent media accesses stored aggressive scripts more readily, so they are more likely to interpret cues as aggressive and resort to a violent solution without considering the alternatives. This suggests that interventions could potentially reduce aggressive behaviour by challenging hostile cognitive devices.

Limitations

• One limitation of cognitive priming is confounding variables in research - for example research into the effects of video games has found that playing violent games primes violent behaviour more than nonviolent games do. The problem is that violent games tend to be much more complex in their gameplay than nonviolent games and this complexity is a confounding variable. Zendle found that when complexity was controlled, the priming effects of violent video games disappeared therefore the supportive findings of studies into priming at least be partly due to confounding variables

• Cognitive priming is reductionist because it explains aggression mainly in terms of internal mental processes, such as the activation of schemas and associative networks. This ignores other important influences, including biological factors like hormones and genetics, as well as broader social and cultural factors. As a result, the explanation oversimplifies aggression and does not fully capture its complexity.