Media violence, which influences the behavior of most children, is increasingly becoming a concern in public health and public policy. Concerns have been made regarding whether media or television violence poses serious threats to the behavior or health developments of children. Feshbach and Tangney (2008) states that many studies have found a connection between television aggressive behavior and violence. It is evident that exposure to television violence can trigger violent and aggressive behavior.
According to a study by Murray et al. (2006), the findings revealed that television programs that portrayed violent behavior activated specific parts of the brain among children. It was found that exposure to media violence selectively activated regions of the right hemisphere of the brain including inferior parietal, precuneus, amygdala, premotor and prefrontal cortex, and posterior cingulate. This part of the region deals with motor programming, episodic memory encoding and retrieval, arousal and attention, and regulation of emotion. This is enough indicator that exposure to television violence contributes to aggression behavior in children.
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Similarly, a study by Singer et al. (2004) reveals that exposure to media violence causes symptoms of psychological trauma. Parental monitoring has a significant impact on television viewing habits of children. It helps to limit the exposure of children to media violence. However, parental monitoring needs understanding of the norms and practices that influences their children to view violence.
However, according to Feshbach and Tangney (2008), viewing television shows that reveal episodes where violent behavior is penalized may prevent development of feelings of aggression. The study findings indicate that punishment is a better deterrence method towards violent behavior. Children fear punishment and if they are able to view episodes where the wrongdoers are punished, then the children will refrain from engaging in violent behavior or actions of aggression. Therefore, Feshbach and Tangney (2008) states that although exposure to television violence results in aggressive behavior among children, it can also help to prevent violent behavior in scenes where those engaging in violent behavior are punished.
References
Feshbach, S., & Tangney, J. (2008). Television viewing and aggression: Some alternative perspectives. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 3(5), 387–389. https://doi-org.ezp.waldenulibrary.org/10.1111/j.1745-6924.2008.00086.x
Murray, J. P., Liotti, M., Ingmundson, P. T., Mayberg, H. S., Pu, Y., Zamarripa, F., … Fox, P. T. (2006). Children’s brain activations while viewing televised violence revealed by fMRI. Media Psychology , 8 (1), 25–37. https://doi-org.ezp.waldenulibrary.org/10.1207/S1532785XMEP0801pass:[_ ]3
Singer, M. I., Flannery, D. J., Guo, S., Miller, D., & Leibbrandt, S. (2004). Exposure to Violence, Parental Monitoring, and Television Viewing as Contributors to Children’s Psychological Trauma. Journal of Community Psychology , 32 (5), 489–504. https://doi-org.ezp.waldenulibrary.org/10.1002/jcop.20015
