J Nurs Acad Soc.  1994 Mar;24(1):85-95.

Media Violence and Delinquent Behavior

• Kim SS
• Kim HS

Abstract

The effects of media violence on the delinquent behavior and violence of children and adolescent are controversial. However, a small but genuine association appears to exist between media violence and aggression or violence. At the present, for a considerable proportion of the population of children and adolescent, delinquent behavior and violence has become a major problem and a way of life. One factor contributing to this problem has been assumed to be the negative influence of mass media including television, drama, videotapes and fiction magazines and so on. Therefore, this paper is intended to discriminate the causal relationship of influence of mass media and juvenile delinquent behabior and violence and to provide nine hypotheses derived from reviewing the literature related to mass media and delinquent behavior. The nine hypotheses are as follows; 1. The presence of modeling mass media crime themes and the extent of interest in and exposure of children and adolescent to media violence themes will be positively correlated to their delinquent (aggressive) behavior. 2. A higher positive correlation will be revealed between interest in and exposure to media violence themes and aggressive behavior among adolescent having parental rejection than among adolescent not experiencing parental rejection. 3. A higher positive relationship will be found between interest in and exposure to mass media crime themes and delinquent behavior among youth having need deprivation than among youth not having need frustration. 4. A higher positive relationship will be presented between the presence of imitating mass media crime themes and interest in and exposure to media violence themes and delinquent or aggressive behavior among youth dysplaying their maladaptive character tendency than among those adolescent dysplaying adaptive character tendency. 5. A higher positively correlating relationship will be shown between interest in and exposure to mass media crime themes and delinquent behavior among youth with a higher scores of depressive trend than among those youth having few or no depression. 6. A higher positive relationship will be found between interest in and exposure to media violence themes and aggressive behavior among adolescent complaining of a high degree of psychosomatic complaints than among those youth having few or no psychosomatic complaints. 7. A higher positive correlation will be appeared between interest in and exposure to mass media crime themes and delinquent behavior among youth displaying aggressive impulsiveness than among those youth having few or no aggressive impulsiveness. 8. A higher positive relationship will be found between interest in and exposure to media violence themes and aggressive behavior among youth having antisocial character or neurotic character with weak ego functioning than among those adolescent not having antisocial character or neurotic character with weak ego functioning. 9. A higher positive correlation will be existed between interest in and exposure to mass media crime themes and delinquent behavior among adolescent displaying the lack of sociality than among those youth not having the lack of sociality. The above nine hypotheses will be tested by statistical methods including Chi-square test, simple correlation, principal component analysis, principal component regression analysis and LISREL path analysis.

MeSH Terms

Adolescent
Aggression
Child
Crime
Depression
Drama
Ego
Frustration
Humans
Mass Media
Parents
Periodicals as Topic
Principal Component Analysis
Television
Videotape Recording
Violence*