Violent entertainment and cooperative behavior: Examining media violence effects on cooperation in a primarily Hispanic sample.

Abstract

The impact of violent entertainment on viewer behavior remains disputed in the academic community. Although most studies focus on negative outcomes such as aggression, some studies also consider whether violent entertainment may reduce positive behaviors such as cooperation. The current article describes 2 studies of violent TV influences on cooperative behavior. The first study examined whether exposure to violent TV shows impacted cooperative behavior using the prisoner’s dilemma task in a sample of 181 mostly Hispanic young adults. Results indicated that exposure to violent TV had no impact on short-term cooperative behavior. Long-term exposure to violent TV in real life also did not predict the level of cooperative behavior. The second study examined how motivational factors influenced the relationship between violent TV and cooperative behavior. Overall, these results do not support traditional media effects models of violent entertainment, at least in regard to short-term influences in an experimental setting.