Executive summary 1
Research questions 1
Research Methodology 2
Literature review 2
Conceptual framework 2
Violence, Media and the Past 2
Findings 3
Discussion 4
The reasons of violent media addiction 4
The impacts of addiction to violent media 5
Conclusions 6
Reference List 6
Executive summary
The subject matter in this report pertains to violence in various types of media such as movies, online and video games. The subject is analyzed from the perspectives of its portrayal, perceptions by individuals and society, its impact on society and the debates surrounding it. People are attracted to violence primarily because of psychological motives and their innate inclinations to violent methods of dispute resolution. However, the development of civilizations imposed effective restraining mechanisms, in particular on the norms of acceptable behaviours. Violent media and violent video games became, therefore, the only means of satisfying psychological violent impulses in some people. Depiction of violence, within certain limits, in media creates no significant threat to the public as long as it does not lead people to real world aggressive behaviours.
Research questions
What is the attraction to violence in the media?
Why are human beings drawn to violence in the media?
Research Methodology
The research was performed through searching for violence in various types of media such as films and games. It also included various aspects of human interest, debate and impacts on society. The research primarily relied on Google Scholar and Google web searches to collect the material for analysis. The search terms used included violence, cruelty, brutality, sadism, hostility, and aggression. The terms were used either alone or in conjunction with terms such as media, films, movie, games, human interest, society, debate, impact and analysis.
Literature review
Conceptual framework
Before the paper is advanced further, it is essentially important to define key terms. The definitions of violence as in behaviour and its media representation can vary widely and is subject to interpretation. Different academic communities provided different definitions of these concepts. In the context of this paper, media violence can be construed as a visual portrayal of the acts of physical aggression committed by one human against another human or piece of fauna for specific purposes, including self-pleasure and hooliganism (Van Rooj, 2010). It is important to highlight that this definition does not imply the acts of violence, which have been mentioned, but not depicted by the media, covering only visually covered acts of physical aggressiveness against people or animals. The evolution of this definition engendered many theories, seeking to explain the effects and outcomes of media violence, which tried to ascertain the types of violent representation, which are particularly persuasive for the viewers.
As far as the concept of violent behaviour is concerned, the unanimous opinion of the academic community is that this concept similar to aggressive behaviour. The importance of the definition framework is pivotal, since it determines how the research results are to be interpreted by the community. Under the concept of aggressive behaviour, the psychologist typically understands physical acts of intended injuries infliction or psychological irritation of other people. The fact can be physical or nonphysical in its nature and scope. It includes many kinds of conventionally accepted behavioural patterns, which are not classified as violence in its daily meaning, like spreading libellous rumours or hurling aggressive insults. The most aggressive and most dangerous behavioural patterns, however, always involve the use or threat of physical violence application. Acts of physical aggression, however, should be distinguished from actions like pushing or shoving. It is typically limited to assaults, fighting or other acts associated with significant probability of serious bodily injury (Wyrwicka, 1996).
Violence, Media and the Past
One of the first records about the media representation of violence can be traced back to ancient Greece, when Plato offered to ban all poets let you disagree, because their ability to describe how ancient heroes killed their enemies of the Republic could easily corrupt the minds of the young people. The works of Plato described poetry as a specific kind of rhetoric, which can influence the people pervasively and harmfully, often leading to psychological disorders by means of creating a dreamlike, unreal state. Plato and his followers advocated the idea that what happens in the theatre have direct effects on what happens in real life. The drama of that times often told the stories of immortal Achilles, Hercules and other famous heroes, whose exploits were comparable to the ones of the gods. Plato broadly discussed that they could not invigorate the young people for glorious victories, but they could make them thinking that their actions can be similar to the actions of Zeus and other divines. One of his followers, Aristotle supported the idea that music and drama were useful, however as long as they do not exist for the sake of violence only. He argued that actors in the theatre should depict real life as it is, but not as it is supposed to be. Glorious victories on the battlefield, cunning assassinations and bloody revenges were commented by him as they think that had nothing to do with the reality (Starsburger, 2010).
In the beginning of the Middle Ages, theatrical representations of demons, Satan, and other representatives of the underground world were primarily directed by the church, which intended to constantly remind people about inescapable advent of apocalypses and hell. The civil authorities, however, strongly opposed the popularization of that culture, because it disseminated fear and panic among the subordinates. Depicting glorious victories and crusades was the main motive of the middle Ages. The rulers sponsored the development of the art, because it helped to direct the attention of the people from the important daily problems, like poor governance, poverty, epidemics, and other issues beyond governmental control.
With the beginning of the Renaissance era, the act of murder and torture became viewed as an object of art. One of the most outstanding French writer August Vaillant immortalized his writings by referring to the fact that the victims do not matter, as long as their gestures were beautiful. His postulates were inherited by the contemporary German composer Stockhausen, who called that 9/11 terrorist attacks with the greatest piece of art that have ever been created by the humanity.
Moreover, the true era of violence proliferation in the media coincided with the development of television and popularization of means of instant communication. The market analytics realized; that people are psychologically attracted to violence. World wars became a winning card for the movie producers and directors, everything connected with battles, military operations and other media pieces became an instant success. The companies started to sponsor violent media projects, when they had opportunities to advertise their products in the pauses. Large audiences will be guaranteed, when the games or movies were somehow related to the depiction of war, catastrophes, or other misfortunes. Overall, late 20 and early 21st century marked the era of violence in the media. The academic community estimated that approximately 41% of all screen time today is occupied by visual portrayals of violent acts.
Findings
A great variety of different depictions of violence appeared in the media from the beginning of the 20th century. Hannibal Lector, created by Thomas Harries and remarkably dramatized by Anthony Hopkins, is one of the most illustrative personalities in the contemporary media. In the world-famous movies, The Silence of the Lambs and its prequel Hannibal by Ridley Scott purposefully create the atmosphere of exhilaration, excitement and impatient anticipation of when, how, and where the main antagonist of the story was going to kill, cut into slices and eat his victim. Then, Quentin Tarantino described his movie Kill Bill as a groundbreaking and intentional aestheticization of murder. A number of world-famous critics describe the movie as a breath-taking fusion, where art and violence harmoniously coalesce into a single, ineffable aesthetic experience for the targeted audience.
Several findings demonstrate that they admire violent movies and video games. In fact, if there is no positive perception from the targeted audiences, the directors, scriptwriters and others engaged into media industry will immediately stop producing such pieces of art. This assumption is applicable not only for movies and game industry, but to mass media in general. Several cross-sectional studies demonstrate that news broadcasts are very oriented on violent events. In average, approximately 61% of all screen time the news tell us about murders, catastrophes, natural disasters, trials, armed hostilities and other events somehow related to acts of violence.
Different theories explore the innate diction of the humanity to violence. These phenomena are usually explained through the mixture of psychological, social, economic and other frameworks (Ferguson, 2007). Great variety of different surveys and research studies attempted to answer why people admire violent behaviour and what consequences this admiration may entail. The results of those findings were considerably ambivalent, demonstrating that the consequences are often circumstantial in their nature. The objective of this paper is to provide unanimity on the available academic findings, to analyse the reasons, which compel the people to watching violent media in playing violent video games and to analyse the outcomes associated with these activities.
Discussion
The reasons of violent media addiction
Despite the fact that the major sources are today occupied was violence is clear, the reasons of this total domination remain unclear. Moreover, recent studies suggested that the number of adults and adolescents addicted to violent video games is increasing on an annualized rate. A recent research study, conducted in Hammersmith Hospital in the United Kingdom demonstrated that the levels of dopamine, a pleasure generating a hormone more than doubles in the brains of the players and viewers of violence. This research demonstrated that videogame playing and viewing violence on TV became chemically addictive for the participants. Despite the fact that there are many ongoing academic debates on whether addiction to video games are violent movies really exists, the fact that specific behavioural pattern exists is undeniable (Ferguson, 2007).
In addition, the studies demonstrated that the combination of intentional programming techniques utilized by the graphic designers of the movies and video games and innate, natural predisposition of the youngsters to addictive behaviours produce a real problem for the parents, teachers and friends.
The researchers from the University of Berlin in cooperation with their colleagues from the University of Wisconsin conducted another groundbreaking research study. The study explored why the movie audiences became attracted to bloody scenes and violence in general. The study analysed whether the motivations, which compelled the viewers to contemplate that portrayals were merely of intellectual pleasure nature or other motives influenced them.
In order to validate or reject the research assumptions, a total sample of 482 participants from the United States of America and Germany within the range of 18-82 the research team has examined years of age and with different educational level (Savage, Yancey, 2008). In the course of the experiment, the participants viewed the travellers of the movies, being absolutely meaningless and demonstrated some degrees of violence. None, the people, has been questioned about their desire to see the full movie, and they described their perceptions of the seen trailer. The first evidences collected by the research team demonstrated that the people are not necessarily attracted to violence as it is, but the typically admire violent behaviour if it is somehow connected with other emotional benefits, such as suspense, thrill or aesthetical pleasure. However, recent interpretation of the research results demonstrated that these hedonistic feelings could be pleasant per se and explain why the people are so much attracted to the scenes of blood shedding or aggression.
In particular, it has been revealed that some elements of violent depictions attract audience because they offer to seek true motivations of the people, by means of offering meaningful insights into certain, specific aspects of our reasoning and cognition. Several researchers from the United Kingdom describe this phenomena as a perceived from moving, thought-provoking and emphatic issue, which foster admiration for the acts of depicted courage and bravery, compassion to the victims and self reflection concerning the demonstrated violent impulses. In other words, the people subconsciously compare and contrast themselves to the main protagonists and antagonists of the story, concluding on their behavioural patterns under similar circumstances, and receiving some kind of aesthetic pleasure from the process. The findings of this research have been presented at the 63rd annual conference of the international communication Association conducted in London and caused many controversies there.
Furthermore, some analytics argues that the people are innately attracted to the acts of heroism and self-sacrifice, which is most transparently seen through violent behaviours and violent acts. The author speculates that in the recent past wars and other military hostilities were common, provided ample opportunities for the men to demonstrate their courage. Nowadays, however, with the advent of technology these opportunities became scholars, while inborn natural impulses are still present. The well-established and regulated law-enforcement frameworks effectively deter the people, making it impossible for them to engage in violent behaviour themselves. The analysis of brain processes displayed that supervising violence is sometimes more pleasant than participating violent acts. Apart from not having the possibility of committing violent actions, the people may be restrained by other factors such as fear of penalty, fear for retaliation or others (Huesmann, 1986). The research analysts often referred to the gladiatorial competitions of ancient Rome, where the people had many opportunities to join the Roman legions and to unbridle all their violent rushes, but nevertheless they preferred viewing the battles from the benches of Coliseum.
The appearance of video games made participation possible, without direct physical involvement and therefore without any potential outcomes for physical health. Recent studies demonstrate that far larger numbers of people became addicted to video games, then to the movies. In particular, studies demonstrate that every fourth adolescent in the United States between 15 and 21 years of fish demonstrates some symptoms of video gaming addictiveness (Phillips, 1983). In fact, these statistics vary across the countries, demonstrated that a steady increase in game junkies is present.
The impacts of addiction to violent media
Some scholars suggest that the impact of playing violent video games is far greater than giving violent movies because the people become substantially more inclined to commit violent actions. Others fervently argue that the influence of any type of violent media, including movies, news, radio broadcasts and games is practically equal. Several research studies conducted in the United States of America demonstrated that both addiction to movies or video games result in pathological behavioural patterns, which include damage to academic life, family and social life in general psychological functioning.
However, similar studies found out that there is no established relationship between these behavioural patterns and addictiveness to movies or video games. It is mentioned, that addiction to the different media types can cause the symptoms, but at the same time, it is speculated that poor academic performance or thinking capabilities make us this attraction to media, so that the player or the viewer can experience a feeling of mastery, and therefore get aesthetic and psychological pleasure (Mitrofan, Paul & Spencer, 2008).
Conclusions
Our findings demonstrate that the people are attracted to violence primarily because of psychological motives and their innate inclinations to violent methods of dispute resolution (Van Rooj, 2010). However, the development of our civilization in general and the appearance of effective restraining mechanisms in particular impose limitations on the possible ways of behaviour. Violent media and violent video games became, therefore, the only means of satisfying aesthetical and psychological violent impulses. Moreover, the research demonstrated that the depiction of violent media creates no threat to the public as long as it do not leads to real world aggressive behavioural patterns of the people.
Reference List
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Huesmann, LR, 1986, Psychological processes promoting the relation between exposure to media violence and aggressive behaviour by the viewer, Journal of Social Issues, 42, 125–139.
Mitrofan, O., Paul, M. & Spencer, N, 2008. Is aggression in children with behavioral and emotional difficulties associated with television viewing and video game playing? A systematic review. Child: care, health and development, 35(1), 5-15.
Phillips DP. 1983. The impact of mass media violence on U.S. homicides. Am. Sociol. Rev. 48:560–68
Savage, J., & Yancey, C,2008, The effects of media violence exposure on criminal aggression. A meta-analysis. Criminal Justice and Behavior, 35, 772–791.
Strasburger, V.C., Jordan, A.B. & Donnerstein, E., 2010. Health effects of media on children and adolescents. Official journal of the American academy of paediatrics, 125(4), 756.
Van Rooij, A.J. et al., 2010. Video game addiction and social responsibility. Addiction Research and Theory, 18(5), 489-493.
Wyrwicka W. 1996. Imitation in Human and Animal Behaviour. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction.
