Page 300 - The Social Animal

282 The Social Animal

more than 700 families over a period of 17 years. Their findings are
striking: There was a significant association between the amount of
time spent watching television during adolescence and early adult-
hood and the likelihood of subsequent violent acts against others.
This association was significant regardless of parental education,
family income, and neighborhood violence. Moreover, unlike most
laboratory experiments on aggression which, understandably, must
use rather pallid measures of aggression (like administering electric
shocks or loud noises to the victim), this study, because it took place
in the real world over a long period, was able to examine severe ag-
gressive behavior like assault and armed robbery.
On numerous occasions, adult violence seems to be a case of life
imitating art. For example, several years ago, a man drove his truck
through the window of a crowded cafeteria in Killeen, Texas, and
began shooting people at random. By the time the police arrived, he
had killed 22 people, making this the most destructive shooting spree
in American history. He then turned the gun on himself. In his
pocket, police found a ticket stub to The Fisher King, a film depict-
ing a deranged man firing a shotgun into a crowded bar, killing sev-
eral people.
Did seeing the film influence the violent act? We cannot be sure.
But we do know that violence in the media can and does have a pro-
found impact on the behavior of adults. Several years ago, David
Phillips scrutinized the daily homicide rates in the United States
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and found that they almost always increased during the week follow-
ing a heavyweight boxing match. Moreover, the more publicity sur-
rounding the fight, the greater the subsequent increase in homicides.
Still more striking, the race of prizefight losers was related to the race
of murder victims after the fights: After white boxers lost fights,
there was a corresponding increase in the murder of white men but
not of black men; after black boxers lost fights, there was a corre-
sponding increase in the murder of black men but not of white men.
Phillips’s results are convincing; they are far too consistent to be dis-
missed as merely a fluke. Again, this should not be construed as in-
dicating that all people or even a sizable percentage of people are
motivated to commit violence after watching media violence. But the
fact that some people are influenced—and that the results can be
tragic—cannot be denied.