TY  - JOUR
A1  - Möller, Ingrid
A1  - Krahé, Barbara
A1  - Busching, Robert
T1  - Consumption of media violence and aggressive behavior a longitudinal study of German adolescents with and without migration background
JF  - Zeitschrift für Entwicklungspsychologie und pädagogische Psychologie
N2  - The consumption of media violence and aggressive behavior were assessed three times in a sample of N=1,052 German adolescents with and without migration background over a period of two years with 12-month intervals. The adolescents in the two groups, who were in grades 7 and 8 at T1, were matched by gender, age, type of school, and academic achievement. Students in the migrant group reported higher consumption of violent media. At T3, they showed more physical but less relational aggression than their peers of German background. Cross-lagged panel analyses showed parallel associations between media violence use and aggression in both groups: Media violence consumption at T1 and T2 predicted physical aggression at T2 and T3 independent of ethnic background. The reverse path from physical aggression to media violence consumption was nonsignificant. No link was found between media violence use and relational aggression over time.
KW  - media violence
KW  - aggression
KW  - migration
KW  - adolescence
KW  - longitudinal study
Y1  - 2013
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1026/0049-8637/a000086
SN  - 0049-8637
VL  - 45
IS  - 3
SP  - 121
EP  - 130
PB  - Hogrefe
CY  - Göttingen
ER  - 
TY  - JOUR
A1  - Krahé, Barbara
A1  - Moeller, Ingrid
A1  - Kirwil, Lucyna
A1  - Huesmann, L. Rowell
A1  - Felber, Juliane
A1  - Berger, Anja
T1  - Desensitization to media violence links with habitual media violence exposure, aggressive cognitions, and aggressive behavior
JF  - Journal of personality and social psychology
N2  - This study examined the links between desensitization to violent media stimuli and habitual media violence exposure as a predictor and aggressive cognitions and behavior as outcome variables. Two weeks after completing measures of habitual media violence exposure, trait aggression, trait arousability, and normative beliefs about aggression, undergraduates (N = 303) saw a violent film clip and a sad or a funny comparison clip. Skin conductance level (SCL) was measured continuously, and ratings of anxious and pleasant arousal were obtained after each clip. Following the clips, participants completed a lexical decision task to measure accessibility of aggressive cognitions and a competitive reaction time task to measure aggressive behavior. Habitual media violence exposure correlated negatively with SCL during violent clips and positively with pleasant arousal, response times for aggressive words, and trait aggression, but it was unrelated to anxious arousal and aggressive responding during the reaction time task. In path analyses controlling for trait aggression, normative beliefs, and trait arousability, habitual media violence exposure predicted faster accessibility of aggressive cognitions, partly mediated by higher pleasant arousal. Unprovoked aggression during the reaction time task was predicted by lower anxious arousal. Neither habitual media violence usage nor anxious or pleasant arousal predicted provoked aggression during the laboratory task, and SCL was unrelated to aggressive cognitions and behavior. No relations were found between habitual media violence viewing and arousal in response to the sad and funny film clips, and arousal in response to the sad and funny clips did not predict aggressive cognitions or aggressive behavior on the laboratory task. This suggests that the observed desensitization effects are specific to violent content.
KW  - media violence
KW  - desensitization
KW  - physiological arousal
KW  - aggressive cognitions
KW  - aggressive behavior
Y1  - 2011
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1037/a0021711
SN  - 0022-3514
VL  - 100
IS  - 4
SP  - 630
EP  - 646
PB  - American Psychological Association
CY  - Washington
ER  - 
TY  - JOUR
A1  - Krahé, Barbara
A1  - Busching, Robert
T1  - Breaking the Vicious Cycle of Media Violence Use and Aggression: A Test of Intervention Effects Over 30 Months
JF  - Psychology of violence
N2  - Objective: This study examined the sustained efficacy of a media violence intervention in reducing media violence use, normative acceptance of aggression, and aggressive behavior in adolescents. It used an experimental design to evaluate the effects of the intervention over a period of 30 months. Method: N = 627 German 7th and 8th graders were assigned to a 5-week school-based intervention to reduce media violence use or to a no-intervention control group. Media violence use, normative acceptance of aggression, and aggressive behavior were measured 3 months before the intervention (T1), 7 months post intervention (T2), and at 2 follow-ups 18 (T3) and 30 (T4) months after the intervention. This article focuses on the findings from the 2 follow-ups. Results: Controlling for baseline levels and various demographic covariates, media violence use at T2, T3, and T4 and self-reported physical aggression at T3 were significantly lower in the intervention group, and the indirect path from the intervention to T3 aggression via T2 media violence use was significant. Lower T2 media violence use predicted lower T3 normative acceptance of aggression among participants with lower initial aggression. No effects on nonviolent media use and relational aggression were observed. Conclusion: The findings show that a short class-based intervention can produce lasting changes in media violence use that are linked to a decrease in aggression.
KW  - aggression
KW  - experimental evaluation
KW  - intervention
KW  - longitudinal study
KW  - media violence
Y1  - 2015
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1037/a0036627
SN  - 2152-0828
SN  - 2152-081X
VL  - 5
IS  - 2
SP  - 217
EP  - 226
PB  - American Psychological Association
CY  - Washington
ER  - 
TY  - INPR
A1  - Krahé, Barbara
T1  - Restoring the spirit of fair play in the debate about violent video games a comment on Elson and Ferguson (2013)
T2  - EUROPEAN PSYCHOLOGIST
N2  - This commentary argues that, rather than providing an "exhaustive review," Elson and Ferguson (2013) discuss a selective sample of empirical studies on violent video game use which corroborate their claim that there is no systematic evidence for a link between violent video game play and aggression. In evaluating the evidence, the authors portray a biased picture of the current state of knowledge about media violence effects. They fail to distinguish between aggression and violence and between everyday and clinical forms of aggression. Furthermore, they misrepresent key constructs, such as mediation, moderation, and external validity, to discredit methodologies used to assess aggression and media violence use. The paper moves the debate backward rather than forward, falling behind existing meta-analytic studies that consider a much wider and more balanced range of studies.
KW  - media violence
KW  - aggression
KW  - mediation
KW  - socialization effects
Y1  - 2014
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1027/1016-9040/a000165
SN  - 1016-9040
SN  - 1878-531X
VL  - 19
IS  - 1
SP  - 56
EP  - 59
PB  - Hogrefe
CY  - Kirkland
ER  - 
TY  - JOUR
A1  - Krahé, Barbara
T1  - Risk cactors for the development of aggressive behavior from middle childhood to adolescence
BT  - the interaction of person and environment
JF  - Current directions in psychological science
N2  - In this article, I examine the development of aggressive behavior from middle childhood to adolescence as a result of the interaction between the person and the environment and discuss implications for intervention measures. Three main questions are addressed and illustrated by examples from recent research: What are intrapersonal risk factors for the development and persistence of aggressive behavior from middle childhood to adolescence? What factors in the social environment contribute to the development of aggressive behavior? How do individual dispositions and environmental risk factors interact to explain developmental trajectories of aggressive behavior?
KW  - aggression
KW  - development
KW  - anger regulation
KW  - contagion
KW  - media violence
KW  - peer influences
Y1  - 2020
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1177/0963721420917721
SN  - 0963-7214
SN  - 1467-8721
VL  - 29
IS  - 4
SP  - 333
EP  - 339
PB  - Sage
CY  - Thousand Oaks
ER  - 
TY  - GEN
A1  - Busching, Robert
A1  - Krahé, Barbara
T1  - Charging neutral cues with aggressive meaning through violent video game play
T2  - Postprints der Universität Potsdam : Humanwissenschaftliche Reihe
N2  - When playing violent video games, aggressive actions are performed against the background of an originally neutral environment, and associations are formed between cues related to violence and contextual features. This experiment examined the hypothesis that neutral contextual features of a virtual environment become associated with aggressive meaning and acquire the function of primes for aggressive cognitions. Seventy-six participants were assigned to one of two violent video game conditions that varied in context (ship vs. city environment) or a control condition. Afterwards, they completed a Lexical Decision Task to measure the accessibility of aggressive cognitions in which they were primed either with ship-related or city-related words. As predicted, participants who had played the violent game in the ship environment had shorter reaction times for aggressive words following the ship primes than the city primes, whereas participants in the city condition responded faster to the aggressive words following the city primes compared to the ship primes. No parallel effect was observed for the non-aggressive targets. The findings indicate that the associations between violent and neutral cognitions learned during violent game play facilitate the accessibility of aggressive cognitions.
T3  - Zweitveröffentlichungen der Universität Potsdam : Humanwissenschaftliche Reihe - 678 
KW  - media violence
KW  - aggressive cognitions
KW  - associative networks
KW  - learning
Y1  - 2020
U6  - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-476181
SN  - 1866-8364
IS  - 678
ER  - 
TY  - JOUR
A1  - Busching, Robert
A1  - Krahé, Barbara
T1  - Charging neutral cues with aggressive meaning through violent video game play
JF  - Societies
N2  - When playing violent video games, aggressive actions are performed against the background of an originally neutral environment, and associations are formed between cues related to violence and contextual features. This experiment examined the hypothesis that neutral contextual features of a virtual environment become associated with aggressive meaning and acquire the function of primes for aggressive cognitions. Seventy-six participants were assigned to one of two violent video game conditions that varied in context (ship vs. city environment) or a control condition. Afterwards, they completed a Lexical Decision Task to measure the accessibility of aggressive cognitions in which they were primed either with ship-related or city-related words. As predicted, participants who had played the violent game in the ship environment had shorter reaction times for aggressive words following the ship primes than the city primes, whereas participants in the city condition responded faster to the aggressive words following the city primes compared to the ship primes. No parallel effect was observed for the non-aggressive targets. The findings indicate that the associations between violent and neutral cognitions learned during violent game play facilitate the accessibility of aggressive cognitions.
KW  - media violence
KW  - aggressive cognitions
KW  - associative networks
KW  - learning
Y1  - 2013
U6  - https://doi.org/10.3390/soc3040445
SN  - 2075-4698
VL  - 3
IS  - 4
SP  - 445
EP  - 456
PB  - MDPI
CY  - Basel
ER  - 
TY  - THES
A1  - Busching, Robert
T1  - Affektive und kognitive Desensibilisierung als Konsequenz von Mediengewaltkonsum : eine experimentelle Untersuchung auf Basis lerntheoretischer Überlegungen
T1  - Affective and cognitive desensitization as a consequence of violent media exposure : an experimental investigation based on learning theories
N2  - NutzerInnen von gewalthaltigen Medien geben einerseits oftmals zu, dass sie fiktionale, gewalthaltige Medien konsumieren, behaupten jedoch gleichzeitig, dass dies nicht ihr Verhalten außerhalb des Medienkontexts beeinflusst. Sie argumentieren, dass sie leicht zwischen Dingen, die im fiktionalen Kontext und Dingen, die in der Realität gelernt wurden, unterscheiden können. Im Kontrast zu diesen Aussagen zeigen Metanalysen Effektstärken im mittleren Bereich für den Zusammenhang zwischen Gewaltmedienkonsum und aggressivem Verhalten. Diese Ergebnisse können nur erklärt werden, wenn MediennutzerInnen gewalthaltige Lernerfahrungen auch außerhalb des Medienkontexts anwenden. Ein Prozess, der Lernerfahrungen innerhalb des Medienkontexts mit dem Verhalten in der realen Welt verknüpft, ist Desensibilisierung, die oftmals eine Reduktion des negativen Affektes gegenüber Gewalt definiert ist. Zur Untersuchung des Desensibilisierungsprozesses wurden vier Experimente durchgeführt. Die erste in dieser Arbeit untersuchte Hypothese war, dass je häufiger Personen Gewaltmedien konsumieren, desto weniger negativen Affekt zeigen sie gegenüber Bildern mit realer Gewalt. Jedoch wurde angenommen, dass diese Bewertung auf Darstellungen von realer Gewalt beschränkt ist und nicht bei Bildern ohne Gewaltbezug, die einen negativen Affekt auslösen, zu finden ist. Die zweite Hypothese bezog sich auf den Affekt während des Konsums von Mediengewalt. Hier wurde angenommen, dass besonders Personen, die Freude an Gewalt in den Medien empfinden weniger negativen Affekt gegenüber realen Gewaltdarstellungen zeigen. Die letzte Hypothese beschäftigte sich mit kognitiver Desensibilisierung und sagte vorher, dass Gewaltmedienkonsum zu einem Transfer von Reaktionen, die normalerweise gegenüber gewalthaltigen Reizen gezeigt werden, auf ursprünglich neutrale Reize führt. Das erste Experiment (N = 57) untersuchte, ob die habituelle Nutzung von gewalthaltigen Medien den selbstberichteten Affekt (Valenz und Aktivierung) gegenüber Darstellungen von realer Gewalt und nichtgewalthaltigen Darstellungen, die negativen Affekt auslösen, vorhersagt. Die habituelle Nutzung von gewalthaltigen Medien sagte weniger negative Valenz und weniger allgemeine Aktivierung gegenüber gewalthalten und nichtgewalthaltigen Bildern vorher. Das zweite Experiment (N = 103) untersuchte auch die Beziehung zwischen habituellem Gewaltmedienkonsum und den affektiven Reaktionen gegenüber Bildern realer Gewalt und negativen affektauslösenden Bildern. Als weiterer Prädiktor wurde der Affekt beim Betrachten von gewalthaltigen Medien hinzugefügt. Der Affekt gegenüber den Bildern wurde zusätzlich durch psychophysiologische Maße (Valenz: C: Supercilii; Aktivierung: Hautleitreaktion) erhoben. Wie zuvor sagte habitueller Gewaltmedienkonsum weniger selbstberichte Erregung und weniger negative Valenz für die gewalthaltigen und die negativen, gewalthaltfreien Bilder vorher. Die physiologischen Maßen replizierten dieses Ergebnis. Jedoch zeigte sich ein anderes Muster für den Affekt beim Konsum von Gewalt in den Medien. Personen, die Gewalt in den Medien stärker erfreut, zeigen eine Reduktion der Responsivität gegenüber Gewalt auf allen vier Maßen. Weiterhin war bei drei dieser vier Maße (selbstberichte Valenz, Aktivität des C. Supercilii und Hautleitreaktion) dieser Zusammenhang auf die gewalthaltigen Bilder beschränkt, mit keinem oder nur einem kleinen Effekt auf die negativen, aber nichtgewalthaltigen Bilder. Das dritte Experiment (N = 73) untersuchte den Affekt während die Teilnehmer ein Computerspiel spielten. Das Spiel wurde eigens für dieses Experiment programmiert, sodass einzelne Handlungen im Spiel mit der Aktivität des C. Supercilii, dem Indikator für negativen Affekt, in Bezug gesetzt werden konnten. Die Analyse des C. Supercilii zeigte, dass wiederholtes Durchführen von aggressiven Spielzügen zu einem Rückgang von negativen Affekt führte, der die aggressiven Spielhandlungen begleitete. Der negative Affekt während gewalthaltiger Spielzüge wiederum sagte die affektive Reaktion gegenüber Darstellungen von gewalthaltigen Bildern vorher, nicht jedoch gegenüber den negativen Bildern. Das vierte Experiment (N = 77) untersuchte kognitive Desensibilisierung, die die Entwicklung von Verknüpfungen zwischen neutralen und aggressiven Kognitionen beinhaltete. Die Teilnehmer spielten einen Ego-Shooter entweder auf einem Schiff- oder einem Stadtlevel. Die Beziehung zwischen den neutralen Konstrukten (Schiff/Stadt) und den aggressiven Kognitionen wurde mit einer lexikalischen Entscheidungsaufgabe gemessen. Das Spielen im Schiff-/Stadt-Level führte zu einer kürzen Reaktionszeit für aggressive Wörter, wenn sie einem Schiff- bzw. Stadtprime folgten. Dies zeigte, dass die im Spiel enthaltenen neutralen Konzepte mit aggressiven Knoten verknüpft werden. Die Ergebnisse dieser vier Experimente wurden diskutiert im Rahmen eines lerntheoretischen Ansatzes um Desensibilisierung zu konzeptualisieren.
N2  - Users of violent media often state that they consume fictional violent media and claim that this does not influence their behavior outside of the media context. Media users reason that they can easily distinguish between things learned in a fictional context and things learned in reality. In contrast to these claims, meta-analyses report medium-sized effects between media violence consumption and aggressive behavior. These effects can only be explained if media users also apply learning experiences from the media outside the media context. One of the processes linking learning experiences in the media context to behavior in the real word is desensitization, which is often defined as a reduction of negative affect towards violence. To investigate the process of desensitization, four experiments were conducted. The first hypothesis investigated in these experiments was that persons who have a higher level of violent media exposure show less negative affect towards depictions of real violence compared to persons with a lower level. However, it was assumed that this reduction in reaction would be limited to depictions of real violence and would not be found in response to depictions of nonviolent pictures electing negative affect. The second hypothesis referred to the role of affect experienced during exposure to media depictions of violence, assuming that especially people who enjoy the violence while consuming the media show less negative affect towards depictions of real violence. The final hypothesis addressed cognitive desensitization effects and predicted that media violence use leads to transfer effects from responses to violent cues to initially neutral stimuli The first experiment (N = 57) examined to what extent the habitual use of media violence predicts the self-reported affect (Valence and Arousal) towards depictions of real violence and nonviolent pictures eliciting negative affect. Habitual media violence exposure predicted less negative valence and less arousal toward violent pictures and negative nonviolent pictures. The second experiment (N = 103) also examined the relationship between habitual media violence exposure and the affective reactions towards images of real violence as well as negative, nonviolent scenes. Additionally, affect while watching violent media was added as a second predictor. The affect toward the images was also obtained by psychophysical measures (Valence: activity of C. Supercilii; Activation: skin conductance). As in experiment 1, habitual media violence exposure predicted less self-reported negative valence and less self-reported arousal for the violent pictures and the negative nonviolent pictures. The physiological measures replicated this result. However, a different pattern emerged for the enjoyment of violent media. People who enjoyed violent media more showed a reduction of affective responsivity toward violence on all four different measures. Additionally, for three of the four measures (skin conductance, self-reported negative valence and the activity on the C. Supercilii) this relationship was limited to the violent pictures, with no or little effect on the negative, but nonviolent pictures. A third experiment (N = 73) studied affect while participants played a violent computer game. A game was specially programmed in which specific actions could be linked to the activity of the C. Supercilii, an indicator for negative affect. The analysis of the C. Supercilii showed that repeatedly performing aggressive actions during the game led to a decline in negative affect accompanying the aggressive actions. The negative affect during aggressive actions in turn predicted less negative affective responses to violent images of real-life violence but not to nonviolent, negative images. The fourth experiment (N=77) showed cognitive desensitization effects, which involved the formation of links between neutral and aggressive cognitions. Participants played a first-person shooter game either on a ship or a city level. The relationship between neutral constructs (ship/city) and aggressive cognitions was measured using a lexical decision task. Playing the game in a ship/city level led to shorter reaction time for aggressive words following ship/city primes respectively. This indicated that the neutral concepts introduced in the game had become associated with aggressive cognitions. The findings of these four experiments are discussed in terms of a learning theory approach to conceptualizing desensitization.
KW  - Mediengewalt
KW  - Desensibilisierung
KW  - Videospiele
KW  - physiologische Verfahren
KW  - Aggression
KW  - media violence
KW  - desensitization
KW  - video games
KW  - psychophysiological measures
KW  - aggression
Y1  - 2014
U6  - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus-71360
ER  -