3.5 Desensitisation, Disinhibition, Cognitive Priming

Question 1

What is desensitisation?

Answer 1

Reduced sensitivity to a stimulus as a result of repeated exposure (may be psychological or physiological)

Question 2

What is the link between desensitisation and aggression?

Answer 2

• Normally when we witness violence actions, we experience physiological arousal
• When children repeatedly view aggression e.g in the media, they become used to its effects
• The stimulus has a lesser impact (anxiety and arousal is lower)

Question 3

What is the psychological effect of desensitisation?

Answer 3

• Repeated exposure to violent media, promotes belief of aggression as method of resolving conflict
• It is viewed as socially acceptable, and negative attitudes towards it weaken

Question 4

Describe Weisz and Earls (1995) study on desensitisation

Answer 4

• Showed participants a film containing prolonged/graphic rape scene
• Participants then watched rape trial re-enactment
• Participants expressed less sympathy towards rape victim + less likely to find defendant guilty (compared to those who watched non-violent film)
• There was no such film type effect on females

Question 5

What is disinhibition?

Answer 5

A lack of restraint, resulting in socially unacceptable behaviour becoming acceptable and more likely

Question 6

Describe the disinhibition explanation

Answer 6

• After watching violent media, usual restraints loosened
• Aggressive behaviour in media appears normative and socially sanctioned
• Video games may show violence being rewarded or consequences minimised
• This creates new social norms in the viewer

Question 7

What is cognitive priming?

Answer 7

The way a person thinks is triggered by cues or scripts which make us ready to respond in different ways

Question 8

Describe the role of cognitive priming in aggression

Answer 8

• Repeated viewing of aggressive media, can provide a ‘script’ of how aggressive situations will play out
• This is stored in memory, so we become ready/primed to be aggressive
• The script is triggered when we encounter cues in a situation we perceive as aggressive

Question 9

Describe Fischer and Greitemeyer’s (2006) study on cognitive priming

Answer 9

• Men listened to songs featuring aggressive/derogatory lyrics about women
• Compared to when they listened to neautral music
• Participants recorded mpre negative qualities about women + behaved more aggressively towards female confederate
• Procedure was replicated with women, and results were similar

Question 10

What can lead to disinhibition?

Answer 10

• Environmental triggers
• Overexposure to a stimulus

Question 11

AO3 for role of desensitisation

Answer 11

1. Research support:
- Krahe et al (2011)=showed participants violent + non-violent films while measuring arousal using skin conductance
- habitual viewers of violence showed lower levels of arousal
- viewers also gave louder bursts of white noise to confederate without provocation
- desensitisation supported and linked to greater aggression levels

2. Alternative explanation:
- Krahe failed to link media viewing, lower arousal and aggression
- catharsis may be a more valid explanation
- suggests media viewing allows people to release aggressive impulses without behaving violently
- not all aggression a result of desensitisation

Question 12

AO3 for role of disinhibition

Answer 12

1. Research support:
- Berkowitz + Alioto (1973)=participants who watched film depicting aggression as vengeance, gave more/longer electric shocks to confederate
- aggression disinhibited if presented as justified/socially acceptable
- demonstrates link between removal of social constraints and aggressive behaviour

2. Cartoon violence:
- children do not learn specific aggression from cartoon models (as can be highly unrealistic)
- instead learn that it is acceptable, especially if the model is not punished
- this disinhibits aggressive behaviour

Question 13

AO3 for role of cognitive priming

Answer 13

1. Real-world application:
- Bushman+Anderson (2002)=habitual violent viewers access aggressive scripts more readily
- more likely to interpret cues as aggressive and resort to violent solutions
- violence often depends on how people interpret environmental cues
- depends on cognitive scripts stored in memory
- aggression reduced by challenging hostile cognitive biases

2. Confounding variables:
- research shows that playing violent games primes violent behaviour more than non-violent games
- complexity of violent video-games is a confounding variable
- Zendle et al (2018)=found when complexity was controlled, priming effects disappeared
- so priming may be partly due to confounding variables