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Abstract
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The independent contributions of action and violence in television programs to children's attention and social behavior were investigated in 66 preschool boys and girls. Same-sex pairs of these children were assigned to one of four television conditions: (a) High action-high violence, (b) High action-low violence, (c) Low action-low violence, or (d) No TV. Action was defined as rapid movement by characters and objects; violence was physical aggression by characters. Visual attention was greater in high action than in low action programs; there were no differences in attention as a function of violence when action was controlled. Children were observed in free play sessions before and after viewing. Those who saw Low action-low violence TV or who saw No TV increased in imaginative, fantasy play; those who saw High action-high violence decreased in imaginative play; the High action-low violence group fell in between. There was some tendency for aggressive behavior to follow the opposite pattern--higher aggression following High action-high violence or High action-low violence than after Low action-low violence or No TV. There were no differences in activity level as a function of treatment. The results were interpreted as supporting arousal theory more strongly than observational learning theory. VioLit summary:
OBJECTIVE:
The purpose of this article by Huston-Stein et al. was to analyze how action and violence in TV programs affected preschoolers' attention and social behavior. The study was framed by general arousal and modeling theories.
METHODOLOGY:
An experimental design was employed using 66 pre-schoolers enrolled in a university nursery school. Ages of the subjects ranged from 3.5 to 5.5 years. Subjects were randomly assigned to one of four TV groups: 1) high action, high violence, 2) high action, low violence, 3) low action, low violence, or 4) no TV. The TV programs were selected from 22 Saturday morning kids' programs and were 8-12 minutes in length. Action and violence were rated by a 15 second interval technique designed by the researchers. Interjudgement agreement for all scoring categories was.8 or higher. Children participated in two sessions in pairs that were all same sex and were no more than six months different from one another in age. During a "baseline" session, children were allowed to play with a set of toys and were videotaped through one way glass. One to five days later the experimental session was held. The experimental session involved telling the children they were going to see a TV program and then showing them one of the four dependent conditions. They were also given paper and crayons, and were told that they could either watch the TV, color, or talk. When the program ended, the experimenter returned to the room with the same set of toys as in the "baseline" session and told the children that they could play. Play behavior was videotaped for ten minutes. Children in the "no TV" group were introduced immediately to the toys and allowed to play for ten minutes. ANCOVA was used to analyze the data.
FINDINGS/DISCUSSION:
To examine the effect of action and violence on attention to the programs, videotapes of the children watching the TV were scored by recording visual orientation to the screen on an event recorder. Rater reliability ranged from 92-96%. Children watched the high action TV programs almost significantly more then they watched the low action programs (p<.051), and differences in violence were insignificant. To examine "social behavior" videotapes of the play session were scored by trained observers for five categories of behavior. These categories are as follows. 1) Serious Aggression (SA)--Physical or verbal attacks on the other child or object. 2) Aggressive Fantasy--any play involving pretend elements and aggressive content. 3) Imaginative Play--all non- aggressive fantasy, pretend, or role playing. 4) Positive Social Interaction--all friendly interaction. 5) Activity Level scored on a 1-4 scale where 1 was quiet and 4 was rapid movement. Experimental scores were analyzed by ANCOVA with the baseline for each dependent variable as its covariate. Imaginative play differed significantly as a function of treatment. EVALUATION:
This study provides an interesting analysis of some of the differences between action and violence, in addition to general effects of television viewing on children's play. The sample size was sufficiently large for an experimental design. With experimental designs, the lack of a large cross-section of subjects limits the population to which one can infer; we have a sample of young preschool children from the central United States. The finding that it is the kind of television and not television itself that serves to dampen fantasy play; if children watch less active, violent programs, they do not differ much from children who don't watch television. Of course, the artificiality of the experiment brings issues of validity into question (e.g., was there an effect of the experiment itself?), but this study leaves some important issues for further research. (CSPV Abstract - Copyright © 1992-2007 by the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence, Institute of Behavioral Science, Regents of the University of Colorado)
KW - Exposure to Violence
KW - Early Childhood
KW - Child Aggression
KW - Aggression Causes
KW - Social Behavior
KW - Television Viewing
KW - Television Violence
KW - Media Violence Effects
KW - Behavior Causes
KW - Early Childhood
KW - Preschool Student
KW - Play Behavior |