Medical associations, including the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Psychological Association, agree that violence children view in the media negatively affects them. They also agree that the greater time the child is exposed, the greater amount of influence they observe. These organizations and many others have campaigned for there to be protections for children against exposure to violent forms of media. The media include television, movies, computer games and video games.
Rates of Exposure
According to the National Institute of Media and the Family, children are exposed to 20 to 25 acts of violence per hour in children's programming. They state that children between the ages of 8 and 18 spend 6 ½ hours a day exposed to potentially violent television and computer games and video games
Particularly Vulnerable
Children are often unable to distinguish between fantasy and reality. They are unable to discern that the context (e.g., fantasy vs. reality) determines the rules for behavior. Children naturally mimic what they see and try out new behaviors and language they observe around them. When exposed to violence as a method to solving problems, that becomes a natural method for them.
Monkey See, Monkey Do
It has been proven in a 15-year longitudinal study that children's exposure to violent media increases their level of aggression. Results showed that men who were exposed to high levels of media violence were significantly more likely to have acted out aggressively (abusively) to their wives. They found that the wives who were highly exposed to violence were more likely to have shown their anger in physical ways, such as throwing objects at their husbands.
Opposing Perspectives
Some people believe that observing violence is cathartic for children that are stressed and angry and they can get out their anger by viewing violent acts, thus making them less aggressive. Some people believe that watching aggression on television and participating in computer games helps give children reasonable fighting skills that they may be called on to use if ever drafted into the army. Some argue that violent children watch violent shows and it is not true that the shows made them violent but merely attracted them.
Controls Inside and Outside the Family
The best controls are for the parents to choose their children's activities and eliminate all exposures to violence. If parents can't monitor their child's television and computer viewing all day, there are parental controls on the computer and the v-chip that can limit what the child can do with these electronic devices. If a movie or game has some violence, but the parent believes it still has some benefit to offer the child, the parent should participate in the viewing/playing and help the child understand it is fantasy and not acceptable behavior in real life, as well as try to interpret the motivations and shortcomings of the characters.
The government has instituted ratings on movies and video games that indicate age ranges for "safe" viewing.
