Solution Assignment 01

Social Psychology

What is television violence?

Violence is defined as "Behavior by persons against persons that intentionally threatens, attempts, or actually inflicts physical harm" (Reiss and Roth, 1993)

So television violence is abusive or unjust exercise of power for the purpose of violation, damage, or abusing to meaning, content, or intent showed by television .

What will you code as television violence? That is, what is your operational definition of television violence? Will you include verbal aggression? Physical aggression? Is injury to another necessary for something to be considered violence? What about psychological injury? Etc. Be specific! That is, what acts of violence do you intend to code while you view the cartoon? (Like you consider only verbal aggression as violence and leave other forms of aggression).

Answer of this question depends on researcher’s personal choice and interest. But be specific and careful while operationally defining the behavior you want to code. For instance researcher considers Physical aggression as television violence. (When one character in cartoon movie physically hits/ hurts other character will be code as violent behaviour)

*****Note: abusive language (verbal aggression and psychological injury is excluded from coding)

Once you decide on how to code television violence in cartoons, indicate what cartoon you will code and write the name of it here as well as the time and day that the cartoon aired.

YOU MIGHT WANT TO VIDEOTAPE THE CARTOON YOU SELECT SO THAT YOU CAN STOP THE TAPE WHILE CODING IF YOU NEED MORE TIME TO WRITE!

Answer of this question is subject to the selection and timing of the cartoon used for coding. For instance:

Cartoon: TOM & Jerry

Day of airing/time: A recorded CD viewed at 12.00p.m. – 12.30p.m. On 18/10/2006

Violent Incident Number Brief Description of the Incident 1 Number of violent incidents may vary, so try to be objective. If cartoon movie that you have selected for coding purpose includes only two or three violent incidents, code accordingly. But if your selected movie contains many violent incidents then you are suppose to code as per requirement. 2 Social Psychology

*****Note: Number of incidents will depend on your coding.

After coding the cartoon for violence, answer the questions listed below:

Did you complete this assignment with a classmate/roommate or friend? If so, who? or did you complete it alone?

Yes I have completed this assignment with my 18 year old friend named Marina, who is a student of Bs sociology.

If you completed this assignment with another person, how difficult was it for you to agree on what constitutes cartoon violence? On what issues did you disagree? (Share your experience)

Some times agreeing on same things/points can be quite difficult. For instance one researcher considers cartoon character poking of folk as physical aggression while other does not.

What challenges do you think researchers face when coding television violence?

Operationally defining the telelevision violence is critical and decisive. Even if researchers can define violence or aggression on TV or in the behaviour of viewers they need to be aware that individual interpretations and special circumstances are important. What is Social Psychology

mildly assertive for one viewer may seem like rampant aggression for someone on the receiving end. Simulated violence in a fantasy drama may be perceived quite differently from violence in a live news item. Researchers need to know how realistic viewers think the action is. Holistic studies are essential. Evidence that exists does not suggest that watching violent programmes inevitably and immediately leads to people behaving violently, and acknowledges the importance of other factors.

Researchers need to be non-biased and need to develop a definition of what is television bias that would be agreed by a large majority of viewers. Another challenge is that most of the advertisers sponsor violent adverts because it catches the viewer’s attention.

The following are some points that need to be considered when coding television violence:

. the dramatic context . the degree of 'realism' . the type of characters involved . the methods used . the degree of harm inflicted . the environment in which the actions took place

Children's self-esteem may be an important factor in their defining of what is 'violent'. Children's experience with the various genres - cartoons, drama and news etc- obviously affects their perceptions of degrees of 'realism'. Programmes perceived by children as realistic are watched with more involvement; more emotion and less detachment than those seem as fantastic such as cartoons. Cartoons are seldom seen by children as being violent at all.