A01

• What is desensitisation?

  • Repeated exposure to violence decreases sensitivity to a stimulus and reduces normal levels of physiological (e.g. lowered heart rate) and psychological (e.g. less emotional response) arousal associated with anxiety making a behaviour such as aggression more likely
  • This causes individuals to be less empathic towards victims and increasingly accept aggression as the 'social norm
• What is disinhibition?

  • A lack of restraint (may be due to environmental triggers or overexposure to a stimulus), resulting in socially unacceptable behaviours becoming acceptable and therefore more likely
  • Exposure to violent media validates the use of violence in real life because it undermines the social sanctions that usually inhibit such behaviour
• What is cognitive priming?

  • The way a person thinks is triggered by cues or "scripts" which make us ready (primed) to respond in specific ways
  • Aggressive media (e.g. guns) act as cues for a schema of an aggressive behaviour and exposure to these cues in a similar context can trigger the memory leading to reproduction of the aggressive behaviour
• Explain how research by Weisz and Earls (1995) shows support for desensitisation

  • After viewing a film depicting various types of aggression and viewing a re-enactment of a rape trial, males were more accepting of interpersonal violence and rape myths, more attracted to sexual aggression, less sympathetic toward the rape trial victim, and less likely to judge the defendant as guilty of rape,
  • This supports desensitisation as an explanation for how the media can increase acceptance of aggressive behaviours
• Explain how research by Berkowitz and Alioto (1973) shows support for disinhibition

  Participants who saw a film depicting aggression as vengeance gave more fake electric shocks of longer duration to a confederate, which suggests media violence may disinhibit aggressive behaviour when presented as justified
• Explain how research by Fischer and Greitemeyer (2006) shows support for cognitive priming

  • After listening to various songs, male participants who listened to misogynous music administered more hot chili sauce to women than to men whilst female participants who listened to men-hating music assigned longer times of ice water treatment to a male target person than did women who listened to neutral and misogynous music
  • This demonstrates the cognitive priming that aggressive song lyrics can have on subsequent aggressive behaviour
• What is research support for desensitisation?

  Weisz and Earls (1995)
• What is research support for disinhibition?

  Berkowitz and Alioto (1973)
• What is research support for cognitive priming?

  Fischer and Greitemeyer (2006)