Albert Bandura was famous for his Bobo doll experiment. In his experiment, he had children witness a model aggressively attacking a plastic clown called the Bobo doll. There were children watching a video where a model would aggressively hit the doll. After the video, the children were placed in a room with attractive toys, but they could not touch them. The children started to become very angry and frustrated. The children were led to another room where there were identical toys used in the Bobo video. Bandura and many other researchers founded that 88% of the children imitated the aggressive behavior observed in the Bobo doll experiment. (Isom, 1998)
The amount of violence in the media is enormous. By the time of elementary school graduation, the average child in the United States will have viewed more than 8,000 murders and more than 800,000 violent acts on television. Most experts would agree that watching high levels of media violence makes viewers more susceptible to acting aggressively. (Feldman, 2010)
Parents can help their children deal with exposure to media violence by playing more with their children and discussing the impact of this with them. And schools can be helpful for parents by helping to teach children to be critical consumers of the media. Researchers point out that “just like food, the ‘you are what you eat’ principle applies to healthy media consumption.” (Mandel, 2012)
Media violence is related to children acting aggressively and having violent behavior. In Albert Bandura’s Bobo doll experiment it showed how children seen someone else aggressively hitting the Bobo doll, the children then copied the violent behavior towards the Bobo doll when they had the chance. Parents could help deal with the exposure the media has with their children if parents would spend more time with them.
Works Cited
Carlson, D. K. (2002, January 22). The Blame Game: Youth and Media Violence. Retrieved from file:///C:/Users/Natii/Documents/school/Natii/Research%20Paper/The%20Blame%20Game%20Youth%20and%20Media%20Violence.webarchive
(2010). In R. S. Feldman, Psychology and your life (p. 188).
Isom, M. D. (1998, November 30). The Social Learning Theory. Retrieved from http://www.criminology.fsu.edu/crimtheory/bandura.htm
Mandel, H. (2012, August 28). Aggression confirmed as being linked to media violence. Retrieved from http://www.examiner.com/article/aggression-confirmed-as-being-linked-to-media-violence
Cited: Carlson, D. K. (2002, January 22). The Blame Game: Youth and Media Violence. Retrieved from file:///C:/Users/Natii/Documents/school/Natii/Research%20Paper/The%20Blame%20Game%20Youth%20and%20Media%20Violence.webarchive (2010). In R. S. Feldman, Psychology and your life (p. 188). Isom, M. D. (1998, November 30). The Social Learning Theory. Retrieved from http://www.criminology.fsu.edu/crimtheory/bandura.htm Mandel, H. (2012, August 28). Aggression confirmed as being linked to media violence. Retrieved from http://www.examiner.com/article/aggression-confirmed-as-being-linked-to-media-violence
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