The effects of sexually arousing and violent films on aggressive behavior∗

Abstract

Arnong the various concerns regarding the effects of mass media the almost perennial worry about the effects of the media's depictions of sex and violence on audience behavior. The most visible evidence of this concern presented itself in the emergence of two Presidential Commissions which stlldied (aluong things) the behavioral effects of sexually arousing material and mass tnedia violence. Both the Commission on Obscenity and Pornography (1970) and the National Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Rliolence (1969) examined the present states of research findings and initiated further studies in both areas and advanced conclusions and recornn-lendations based on their reviews of the available evidence. Despite the independence of both inquiries, one interesting area to emerge from the Obscenity and Pornography Commission's investigation was the study of the relationship between the behavioral effects of sexually arousing media content and violent media content. While sexual behavior and aggressive behavior may appear at first glance to be distinctly different types of behavior, comparisons of physiological characteristics of the organism in both states of arousal show a great deal of similarity. Kinsey (1953) made note of this occurrence when he observed that of the fourteen basic physiological changes taking place during sexual and aggressive arousal, only four differ between the two states. Storr (1970) has further noted that it is not uncommon for one response to suddenly change into the other (p. 18). Several studies done at the request of the Obscenity and Pornography Commission attempted to identify the relationship between aggressive and sexual arousal states. The theoretical basis for these studies hypothesizes that emotional arousal a general state within