1. Antisocial Behavior: Aggression Behavior that is intended to cause harm to persons or property and that is not socially justifiable Based less on consequences and more on intentions Types: Verbal, hostile (cause pain), instrumental (to obtain), and relational (damage social relationships)

2. Aggression Between 18 mos and 5 years, no relation between age and overall aggession Physical and instrumental are greater at younger ages Verbal and hostile are more common at school ages Overall aggression decreases from first to fifth grades

3. Aggression: Gender In preschool and elementary school, boys show more aggression than girls From preschool to adolescence, girls display more relational aggression than boys, and typically directed toward girls Late elementary, physical aggression between boys increases, but by boys towards girls decreases significantly

4. Aggression: Determinants Aggression is stable with age Aggression at 8 years is predictive of level at 30 Identical twins are more similar than fraternal twins Hormones Strong relation between aggression and testosterone level

5. Aggression: Determinants Temperament Difficult babies is predictive of aggression in childhood and adolescence Dominance Chidren display hierarchy established by aggression

6. Aggression: Determinants Family processes Parents use power assertion and excessive physical punishment Parents may be modeling aggressive behavior Aggressive children come from negative home environments (coercive family process) Television Sat morning, 23 violent scenes/hour 2.5-4 hours of TV watching per day Age 21, watched approximately 8,000 murders

7. TV & Aggression TV violence does result in more aggressive children They imitate (especially if violence is performed by the “good guys”) Makes them more tolerant of aggression In turn, it makes them watch more violence Amount of violence watched at age 8 is predictive of crime level at age 30

8. TV & Aggression There has been a clear demonstration of a causal link between amount of violence one watches on TV and level of aggressive behavior What causes the link?

9. TV & Aggression: Social-cognitive observational learning theory Long-term effects of TV on aggression have been linked to Acquisition through observational learning of three social-cognitive structures: schemas about a hostile world social problem solving that focus on aggression, and normative beliefs that aggression is acceptable Young children imitate behaviors they see Observation of specific aggressive behaviors around them increases children’s likelihood of behaving in exactly that way

10. TV & Aggression: Desensitization theory Most humans have an innate negative emotional response to observing blood, gore, and violence. Increased heart rates, perspiration, and self- reports of discomfort accompany exposure With repeated exposure to violence, negative emotional response habituates the observer becomes desensitized

11. TV & Aggression: Other theories Aggressive behavior or a correlate of aggressive behavior stimulates exposure to violence thus engenders the observed relation between them An aggressive child simply “likes” watching media violence more than other children do Social comparison theory suggests that aggressive children feel happier and more justified if they believe they are notalone in their aggression viewing media violence makes them feel happier because it convinces them that they are not alone.

12. TV & Aggression: “third variable” theory Suggests that observed long-term relations between aggression and exposure to media violence are spurious derived from joint association with one or more third variables Such as demographic, family, and personal characteristics, and social class and IQ which are known to be correlated both with TV viewing and with aggression

13. TV & Aggression: Arousal Observed violence (real world or media) arouses the observer aggressive behavior may become more likely due to excitation transfer and general arousal Excitation transfer: a subsequent provocation may be perceived as more severe than it is because emotional response stimulated by the observed violence is misattributed as being due to the provocation General arousal: arousal stimulated by observed violence may reach a peak that the ability to inhibiting aggression is reduced

14. Video Game stats About 10% of children aged 2 to 18 play console and computer video games more than 1 hr/day Among 8- to 13-year-old boys, the average is more than 7.5 hr/week In 1998, 13.3% of men entering college played at least 6 hr/week as high school seniors. 1999, increased to 14.8% 2% of the men reported playing video games more than 20 hr/week in 1998. In 1999, that increased to 2.5%.

15. Video Game stats Fourth-grade girls (59%) and boys (73%) report that the majority of their favorite games are violent ones Teens in grades 8 through 12 report that 90% of their parents never check the ratings of video games before allowing their purchase 1% of the teens’ parents had ever prevented a purchase based on its rating 89% reported that their parents never limited time spent playing video games

16. Video Games & Aggression Why does violent media increase aggression and violence Learning of aggressive cognitive scripts Violent games increase aggression by teaching observers how to aggress, by priming aggressive cognitions, by increasing arousal, or by creating an aggressive affective state. Each violent-media episode is essentially one more learning trial

17. Video Games & Aggression

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