This is your brain on violent media

This is your brain on violent media

www.physorg.com

Violence is a frequent occurrence in television shows and movies, but can watching it make you behave differently?

Although research has shown some correlation between exposure to media violence and real-life violent behavior, there has been little direct neuroscientific support for this theory until now.

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Well, that confirms it. What many parents have long suspected has now been proven. The article continues to describe how repeated exposure to violent scenes deactivates the part of the part of the brain that suppresses violent behaviour.

The yellow area of the brain is the right lateral orbitofrontal cortex, or right ltOFC, which has been previously associated with decreased control over a variety of behaviors, including reactive aggression. The first graph illustrates that as the number of violent movies watched increased, the right ltOFC activity diminished. The second graph shows that when subjects watched the non-violent control clips, there were no systematic changes in the activation of this area.
Credit: Columbia University Medical Center

So much for the argument that violent programs and games will not affect people's judgement. It does. It rewires your brain so that you are less appalled by it likely to put a lid on aggression.

www.physorg.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

Edited for clarity.

[edit on 6-12-2007 by Beachcoma]

reply to post by Beachcoma


very good information, our family resently debated this subject and agreed that in "the good old days" we didnt see so much violence and we had a different look apon violence.

when i was younger I went to disco's alot, and if a fight broke out the people fighting would stop when one of them was lying down. some even took a beer together after the fight.

But today any fight over just a spilled beer or something, seems to trigger a tendence to smack down people and stump them in the head and such.

what the hell is wrong with people??

Interesting study, cheers.

The right lateral OFC (or ventrolateral PFC) is involved in lots of interesting behaviours, generally related to inhibition of emotion. Thus, when individuals with high levels of implicit prejudice are exposed to black faces, the right lateral OFC is activated and reduces activity in the amygdala (an area involved in emotion).

This seems to suggest that exposure to violent media might well affect all kinds of behaviours, from decision-making to social cognition.

Gives me a few ideas for research...

heh.

I thought desensitization was already a well established principle (at least in psychology)? A theme explored in Kubrick's "A Clockwork Orange".

I guess this just explains the exact mechanism from a biological perspective.

Good find.
.

reply to post by Gools


Well, it gives an insight into the neurobiological processes underlying this. I wouldn't push the inference too far though, desensitisation would suggest a lowering of emotional response, this seems to more a case of disinhibiting negative emotions.

I'd have to read the paper, but it may just be a case of the deactivation of the OFC allowing the amygdala greater activation (that is, enabling more fear/anger or reassessing the motivational characteristics of the stimuli). These two brain areas appear to work in concert - with the higher executive frontal mechanism modulating the more core emotional processes of the amygdala.

The lateral OFC is like a filtering mechanism to emotions, controlling and inhibting relevant and irrelevant emotion processed in lower subcortical areas of the brain.

Off to have a read...

ABE: They showed reduced right lOFC, reduced interacton between the OFC and amygdala, more tendency for 'reactive aggression', and SMA (supplementary motor area - readiness to act) activity with increasing exposure to violent stimuli, but didn't report sole amygdala changes.

Would have been interesting. As I would have thought the amygdala would become more activated if they were tending towards being aggressive (i.e., readiness to act aggressively - reactive aggression). Might have been due to the methodology, oh well.

PloS article - Kelly, Grinband, Hirsch (2007)

[edit on 6-12-2007 by melatonin]

This is such bs anyone who watches a Freddy Keuger movie and wants to go commit mass murder it isnt from the movie maybe a simple minded person or mentally unstable can be swayed but I wouldnt blame a violant media for it.

The only thing thats makes me want to commit violant murdering sprees is government abuse of its people.

or when they tell me Ann Goldbaum choked herself while padlocked leg shackled and cuff behind the back chained to a wall.

Her last name must have been changed from Houdini to Goldbaum.

but hey im not a violant person so its all good.

I also thought that it was well acknowledged that certain forms of media increase blood pressure, etc… and the desire to physically act out. Two notable movies that I can think of which had this effect on me were 300 and Black Hawk Down. Don't tell me you didn't feel like goging out and kick someone's A after watching those two movies.

But alas it did not negate my capacity to rationally think about what such possible actions were and about their consequences. This might lead to media control and an excuse in court "oh the movies made me do it", now that is BS.

When compared to other societies, America is a very violent society and that is sure to be expressed in the media. Sort of a chicken/egg scenario.

Look at our contemporary hero's. Not many scholars in there, or humanitarians.

Even our in contemporary culture, art and music has taken on a dark aspect that I find disturbing.

Americans worship strength, violence, war, conquest and domination over the weak.

America in the grand scheme of things is basically an adolescencent culture. Let's hope we have the resources and intelligence to one day mature.


www.scholars.nus.edu.sg...

[edit on 6-12-2007 by whaaa]

Compared to who canada maybe south america drug ridden crime infested corruption france is in its 2nd week of riots over 300,000 man riots rocked the cities for weeks in 2005. middle east I dont need to mention Russia is about to declare war with usa with Iran.

in the late 1990's kroatia lost 1 million civilians from a northern russian army.
China murders millions of babies in there society all run by Planned Parent Hood a US based company explain that! [side point]

So your statement is America is more violant then what country?

Ya Canada and um UK but they dont really count there pop is way to small.

is less Violant then the USA ya you got us on that one buddy.

So much for the argument that violent programs and games will not affect people's judgement. It does. It rewires your brain so that you are less appalled by it.

And that's a bad thing? Desensitization is a natural self defense mechanism. The part of the brain that handles appropriate behaviour and moral choices is also extremely important when determining if someone is going to be violent or not. Seeing some studies about what chemicals and societal influences affect those moral choices would be far more interesting imho.

reply to post by unnamedninja


Yup. It's a bad thing. Even if you didn't read the full article, the excerpts I've posted should give you some idea of what the effects are --

"decreased control over a variety of behaviors, including reactive aggression"

Reactive aggression being the keywords here. As for chemical and societal influence -- I think this covers it as well. Every thing you do or think is linked to neurochemicals in the brain, and the media is part of society

Edit to add: I've edited the commentary to better reflect the significance of this study.

[edit on 6-12-2007 by Beachcoma]

As I said, it's not so much about desensitisation, but more about reducing activity in the regulatory mechanism that controls/regulates aggressive behaviour (i.e., lateral OFC).

Thus, what might happen is that someone who's just seen a violent movie would be more likely to smack you in the face if you nudge them as they leave the cinema. This would be due to weakening of what you could call the suppression or 'no' mechanism in the brain - the higher executive control processes that put a lid on our more reflexive 'animal' instincts.

Desensitisation would just show less emotional reaction to negative/violent stimuli, this actually shows the possibility of losing control of behaviour.

[edit on 6-12-2007 by melatonin]

Kudos to the OP for posting this thread, it's something I've been preaching for a long time and it has fallen on mostly deaf ears. I wonder if research has been conducted in other areas of influence as well such as sexual deviance, or other non-violent criminal behavior comes to mind.
Shows like Jackass and Bam have to have some kind of influence as well, and I always found it a tragic irony that we all collectively wonder how such as pedophiles could behave the way they do, but then we go out and buy mini skirts and make up for our 10 year olds. Some of the television I've seen lately that is marketed to the pre-teen age group is certainly of questionable morality. Television is a box of poison.

Well all the hellraisers in my town, I can't really speak for them since i dont know any personally, but from what I gather these guys dont play videogames or use the net or even hang around much indoors to watch movies, stuff like that is "geeky" They have a bad life at home and spend a lot of the time out with their friends getting drunk and getting violent.

I do believe movies, games and certain internet sites affect society in a negative way, but I'm pretty sure it's having a larger and more subtle effect on middle class kids, magnifying genetic pre-dispositions to mental illnesses, rather than prompting them to go out and commit violence on people.

Still I'm only saying as I see it, i'm pretty sure a large majority of violent people like violent media, but I see it as a chicken and egg situation. Where people with a violent disposition seek out movies/games and stuff just because of that disposition, rather than it making someone violent. Maybe I am naive.

[edit on 6-12-2007 by unnamedninja]

I have always felt it is quite obvious that our environment effects us.

Take military veterans for example. I am sure you know of the mental aggravation and aggression they inhibit as a result of their services. The television is a lesser version of this.

I know this also from personal experience. That is why I know that if I sulk back into the way of violent media (games, television, music) that I eradicated from my life so long ago, that it will have a negative and probably violent effect on me after a long period of exposure.


Nyorai

Please take a look at Dr. Emoto's findings on the effects of our environment on water and therefore ourselves. Check out the pictures and captions.

He was also featured in What the Bleep Do We Know.

[edit on 6/12/2007 by Nyorai]

Originally posted by Bushwacked
Compared to who canada maybe south america drug ridden crime infested corruption france is in its 2nd week of riots over 300,000 man riots rocked the cities for weeks in 2005. middle east I dont need to mention Russia is about to declare war with usa with Iran.

in the late 1990's kroatia lost 1 million civilians from a northern russian army.
China murders millions of babies in there society all run by Planned Parent Hood a US based company explain that! [side point]

So your statement is America is more violant then what country?

Ya Canada and um UK but they dont really count there pop is way to small.

is less Violant then the USA ya you got us on that one buddy.

Okay, since when were you a fortune teller? I can guarantee you Russia has no intentions on declaring war with the US.

Yes, Canada is non-violent... but that's sort of our tradition.

The UK has WAY more people per square mile than the US. Yes, the US has more people overall, but they're so spread out, it's a cakewalk to get away from people for a while so you can cool down.


What's the number one thing the US is proud of? Their military, and it's ability to kill lots of people.


So anyhow, you've gone and compared the US with the worlds notoriously peaceful country Canada, and a few countries who are currently in the news.
Theres a whole world out there you've completely avoided.


Yes, the US is known to the world for it's obsession with violence. Comparing yourself to troubled hotspots does not make the US look any less violent.

Originally posted by Bushwacked
This is such bs anyone who watches a Freddy Keuger movie and wants to go commit mass murder it isnt from the movie maybe a simple minded person or mentally unstable can be swayed but I wouldnt blame a violant media for it.

You're taking it too literally. Watching a violent movie isn't going to make someone suddenly become violent, that's not what is being said. What it does do is over a period of years slowly effect the way you perceive violence. What was shocking 40 yrs ago would be nothing to a person now, imagine what we will tolerate after another 40 yrs?

It's pretty obvious that overall the populations exceptence level of violence is increasing. Think of this, watch a horror movie made in the 50's, it was scary then but now would be less scary than what we see on the early evening news.
The more violence we are subjected to the less it effects us and the more is needed to shock us or make us take action against it. Violence becomes more excepted as a 'normal' part of society and a way with dealing with things.

Look how more violent teenagers are compared to 50 yrs ago (gangs etc), media is a big part of that, in fact the major contributer imo.

reply to post by johnsky


Oh im sorry the recent head of the russian armies comments such as

"The United States has gone evil and is headed for world domination"

And tearing up the cold war peace treaty.over south eastern europe's missle silo's usa is building isn't a reason to believe russia is going to call for war.

what planet do you live on and stop smoking the pixy dust.

Ps don't ask for aLink use Google i'm not the internet im human.

Heres a tip Russian Army Head+USA statements.

And google works for other things as well.

[edit on 6-12-2007 by Bushwacked]