8. Tv is dulling viewers’ reactions to violence and tragedy

Study Suggests Violent Media Dulls Violence Response.

Scientists warn of "aggressive behavior," but critics say the response is just "boredom."

A new study is suggesting that media violence could dampen a teen's response to violence, but the methodology already has its critics. Gamasutra reports that the National Institute of Health study was published in the Social Cognitive & Affective Neuroscience journal. It showed 60 violent scenes from various media to 22 boys, age 14-17. Boys were asked to rate the clips as "low," "mild," or "moderate," and then to rate each clip in comparison to the last one.

The study found that the boys didn't respond as strongly to the violent media after they had been exposed to it, and that they produced less sweat the longer they watched the clips. Dr. Jordan Grafman said this implies "that continued exposure to violent videos will make an adolescent less sensitive to violence, more accepting of violence, and more likely to commit aggressive acts since the emotional component associated with aggression is reduced."

But the study is being criticized by Professor David Buckingham, Director of the Centre for the Study of Children, Youth, and Media, in the U.K. "The suggestion is that, over a period of time, people can develop a kind of tolerance to these images," he said, "but another word for that is just boredom." He suggests that if we're concerned about a violence and aggression, "we need to look at what motivates it in real life."

Though this study in particular may not be cited, studies similar to it are likely to be argued by the State of California in the upcoming Supreme Court case. If the state can successfully argue that game violence promotes real violence, it will go a long way to providing the law's compelling interest, which is necessary to override first amendment protection.

The latest salvo in the ongoing battle in academia and popular culture over the presumed link between violent video games and aggression comes from the University of Missouri, where a new study sought to determine the mechanism of such a link.

Psychologist Dr. Bruce Bartholow’s research suggests the brains of violent video game players become less responsive to violence, and this diminished brain response predicts an increase in aggression.

“Many researchers have believed that becoming desensitized to violence leads to increased human aggression. Until our study, however, this causal association had never been demonstrated experimentally,” said Bartholow, whose study monitored participants’ brain activity.

In the study, 70 young adult participants were randomly assigned to play either a nonviolent or a violent video game for 25 minutes.

Immediately afterwards, the researchers measured brain responses as participants viewed a series of neutral photos, such as a man on a bike, and violent photos, such as a man holding a gun in another man’s mouth.

Finally, participants competed against an opponent in a task that allowed them to give their opponent a controllable blast of loud noise. The level of noise blast the participants set for their opponent was the measure of aggression.

The researchers found that participants who played one of several popular violent games, such as “Call of Duty,” “Hitman,” “Killzone” and “Grand Theft Auto,” set louder noise blasts for their opponents during the competitive task – that is, they were more aggressive – than participants who played a nonviolent game.