Situational Influences on Reactions to Observed Violence.

Although many discussions of the effects of media violence focus on the long-term consequences of frequent exposure to these depictions, short-term influences are also important, and adults as well as children observing aggression are apt to become more aggressive themselves for a brief period afterward. Such an effect is largely due to the activation of ideas and inclinations semantically related to the meaning of the observed event rather than to a long-lasting learning. However, the likelihood of an openly aggressive reaction to television or movie violence is greatly dependent on situational conditions, and the present paper considers some of these conditions. Starting with an examination of what situational factors influence people's desire to view violent programming, this article then proceeds to research bearing on the effects of the presence of other observers, the nature of the available target, situational features operating as retrieval cues, the viewers' interpretations of and thoughts about the violent scenes including their perceived reality, and the observers' focus of attention. The paper argues that research into the effects of media violence should no longer ask how much of an influence is exerted by aggressive protrayals in the media generally, but it should investigate the conditions under which these depictions have a greater or lesser effect.