General Aggression Model

Abstract

The general aggression model, or GAM for short, is a metatheory for understanding the roots of aggression. The GAM is especially useful for understanding how exposure to violent media can increase aggression. In the GAM, personal and situational variables independently and interactively influence a person's internal states (cognition, affect, arousal), which eventually influence behavior. Some people might be more vulnerable to violent media effects than other people, such as people who strongly identify with violent media characters or people who are characteristically aggressive. Such individual differences are personal variables. Exposure to violent media is a situational variable. Thus, there are three routes through which exposure to violent media can increase aggression—through aggressive thoughts, angry feelings, and physiological arousal. Exposure to violent media increases aggressive thoughts, angry feelings, and physiological arousal. Exposure to violent media also decreases feelings of empathy and compassion for others. Internal states, in turn, influence the attributions, decisions, and appraisals a person makes, such as whether an ambiguous action was accidental or intentional. Research shows that exposure to violent media increases hostile appraisals. That is, people who consume violent media are less likely to give someone the benefit of doubt. These findings explain why exposure to violent media increases aggression and decreases helping. People who have aggressive thoughts, who feel angry inside, who are aroused and stressed out, and who make hostile appraisals are especially likely to hurt others and especially unlikely to help others.