DESENSITISATION / DISINHIBITION / COGNITIVE PRIMING

• Desensitisation, disinhibition and cognitive priming are the long term effects on behaviour of habitual use of violent media. 
• DESENSITISATION 


  when witnessing violent actions we experience physiological arousal associated with the SNS = increased heart rate. But when children are exposed to media violence it may stimulate aggression by desensitising children to the effects of violence. The more exposure, the more normal + acceptable aggression is as a method of resolving conflict = habituated to the effects. Negative attitudes towards violence weaken, less empathy is felt for the victims and their injuries are minimised and dismissed. 
• (+) DESENSITISATION 


  WEISZ AND EARLS =

  showed their participants the film straw dogs, which contain prolonged graphic scene of rape. They then watched a reenactment of a rape trial. Compared with those who watched a non-sexually violent film, male viewers of straw dogs showed greater acceptance of rape myths and sexual aggression and also expressed less sympathy towards the rape victim in the trial. = had repeated exposure to the clip as they became habituated to the effects of desensitisation which resulted in the reduction of their anxiety and physiological arousal. 
• (-) DESENSITISATION 


   ignores the effects of our biological makeup, gender + personality, and it ignores the power of our moral codes and self restraint. = too deterministic. The general aggression model may be a better explanation of who or why certain people are vulnerable to the effects of violent media. ANDERSON + GILL propose that our gender personality and the situation all mediate the effects of the media. Thus, suggesting that desensitisation can not be the only long term affecting behaviour of habitual use of violent media. 
• DISINHIBITION 


  is the idea that most people hold the view that violence and aggression are antisocial and harmful. There are powerful social and psychological inhibitions against using aggression to resolve interpersonal conflict.  Exposure to media violence legitimises the use of violence in real life. Moral restraints are loosened and aggressive behaviour is made to appear normative and undermines the social sanctions, especially if the media portrayals minimise the effects of violence on its victims and suggests it is justified. 
• (+) DISINHIBITION 


  BERKOWITZ + ALIOTO =

   found participants who saw a film depicting aggression as vengeance (the act of taking revenge)  gave more (fake) electric shocks of longer duration to a confederate. Violence may disinhibit aggressive behaviour when it is presented as justified. This is because vengeance is a powerful justification for violence, which is seen as more socially acceptable. 
• (-) DISINHIBITION 


  GENDER BIAS - DIENER ET AL =

  found that disinhibition of aggression was greater in males than females as both males and females responded differently under aggressive conditions and so an increase in aggression was only obtained in the all male group. This suggests a gender bias in the theory, where the theory cannot be applied to females. 
• COGNITIVE PRIMING 


   is a temporary increase in the accessibility of thoughts + ideas (short - term effects of media). Repeated viewing of aggressive media, can provide us with a ‘script’ about how violent situations may play out. This script is stored in the memory, so we are ‘ready’ or ‘primed; to be aggressive. It is automatic + can direct our behaviour without us even being aware of it. The script is triggered when we encounter cues in a situation that we perceive as aggressive.
• COGNITIVE PRIMING 


  Frequent action through prolonged exposure to media violence may result in lowered activation threshold, allowing greater access to interpret information. 
• (+) COGNITIVE PRIMING 


  FISCHER AND GREITEMYER =

  who found that male participants recalled more negative qualities about women and behaved more aggressively towards a female confederate, after listening to songs featuring aggressively derogatory lyrics against women. They also found similar results when repeated with females and ‘men - hating lyrics’. 
• (-) COGNITIVE PRIMING 


   can lead to prosocial behaviours. Holloway et al found that participants who ‘overheard’ a pro-social message on a radio in the waiting room before participating in a study involving bargaining were more co-operative in their bargaining than participants who did not hear the bulletin. This suggests the prosocial effect of the cognitive priming of good news.