Brain Changes When Viewing Violent Media

Ponca City, We Love You writes "Scientists at Columbia University have used Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) to show that a brain network responsible for suppressing inappropriate or unwarranted aggressive behaviors became less active after study subjects watched several short clips from popular movies depicting acts of violence. These changes could render people less able to control their own aggressive behavior. Although research has shown some correlation between exposure to media violence and real-life violent behavior, there has been little direct neuroscientific support for this theory until now. 'Depictions of violent acts have become very common in the popular media,' said researcher Christopher Kelly. 'Our findings demonstrate for the first time that watching media depictions of violence does influence processing in parts of the brain that control behaviors like aggression.' The full research paper is published on the The Public Library of Science, a peer-reviewed, open-access, online publication, that publishes all its articles under a Creative Commons Attribution License."

Comments

It's true.

[grub]

After watching violent movies I beat my wife much worse than usual.

How long does it last

[TheLostSamurai]

Our findings demonstrate for the first time that watching media depictions of violence does influence processing in parts of the brain that control behaviors like aggression.
Okay, but how long does it last? Given the fact that I am not very likely to take off my shoe and bludgeon the person in front of me in the theater to death, how does this effect my likelyhood to do the same thing after the movie when I see someone I am not fond of?

OK... but

[MozeeToby]

There's no discussion of how long these effects last. Of course our brain is going to prepare us for violence when we witness violence. If it didn't, you'd probably get killed in your first violent confrontation because you wouldn't be prepared to fight back. The question is, does viewing violent media today make me more likely to go kill people tomorrow.

Re:Hmmmm

[scubamage]

Oh yeah, I forgot! Thanks for clearing that up. Also, did you ever notice that in the US its ok for prime time tv to show someone's bullet riddled corpse, but its not ok for two people to be shown having sex, or even showing nudity? Its like the act of procreation and creating life is taboo, but the act of ending life isn't - and we wonder why we have issues with violence in our nation. Hell, its considered distasteful to even show things like "The Miracle of Life" without it being in a highly academic context.

Re:Bull I play video games all the time.

[LWATCDR]

And if the results of the study are that violent media is harmful then why not restrict young people's access to it just like alcohol and tobacco?
People say that parents should control what there kids watch and play but then why restrict tobacco and alcohol? Shouldn't parents control what kids drink and smoke?
The media companies don't want any real restrictions because just like the Tobacco companies all they care about is money. Any pretense that they care about freedom is just spin.
Hey I like to play Quake just as much as the next person but how the fanboys on Slashdot fall for media compaines freedom flag waving for profit just makes me nuts.

So look at the statistics

[tgibbs]

Not only are they wrong, they overlook a critical piece of information. Games have been becoming more and more realistic.
so when they look back and say "When I was a kid, nobody went crazy" it doesn't exactly apply to current games, Also anecdotal evidence is almost always wrong.

So let's forget about anecdotes and look at the statistics. What has happened to rates of violent crimes as games have gotten more and more realistically violent? They've dropped. What's more, they've dropped most dramatically in the very demographic group that plays these games. That doesn't necessarily prove that games prevent violence, but it does prove that the pro-violence effect of games (if there is any at all) is so small as to be utterly swamped by other social and demographic factors affecting rates of violence.

As for brain scans, you can be sure that pretty much any activity that people enjoy and like to do repeatedly alters brain activity, but the interpretation of these changes in blood flow over rather large regions of the brain is still pretty much at the level of "Just-So" stories. At this point, it's a lot more speculation than science.