disinhibition

• What is disinhibition?

  Normal social constraints are weakened by environmental triggers leading to social acceptance of these actions after exposure to media violence
• Disinhibition

  Most people hold the view that violence and aggression are antisocial and harmful, therefore there are powerful social and psychological inhibitors against using aggression to solve interpersonal conflicts.  Inhibitors are learned directly and indirectly through SLT & are loosened after exposure to violent media. Video games often reward violence and its consequences are minimised or ignored. This creates new social norms for the viewer.
• Berkowitz (1973) - AO3 support


  Demonstrated that when ppts were exposed to media depicting violence as a form of vengeance, they were more likely to participate in longer acts of aggression (electric shocks) when there was a perceived justification for it. This supports disinhibition. However, disinhibition may only apply to certain forms of media with the strongest effect being computer games and not others. This suggests an issue with generalising the view that all forms of media can lead to disinhibition and aggression.
• Goranson - AO3 support


  Found that participants who were shown a video of a boxing match without a negative consequence were more likely to then act in a violent way themselves compared to those who saw the video with a negative consequence.
• Limitations of disinhibition - genetic explanations

  Genetic explanations argue that the MAOA gene (also known as the warrior gene may be responsible for aggressive behaviour as some variations of this gene lead to lower levels of serotonin and therefore less control over aggressive impulses. This provides an alternative explanation to disinhibition as the cause of aggressive behaviour and challenges the influence of family socialisation.
• Limitations of disinhibition - evolutionary psychologists

  Evolutionary psychologists who would also challenge the view that the media is responsible for aggression. Instead, they see aggression as an adaptive behaviour that is needed for survival and prefer to use examples of sexual competition or sexual jealousy to explain male aggression rather than violence in the media.