The debate regarding media violence altering violent human behaviors has remained to be one of the contextually and most debated questions regarding the effectiveness of the violent activities convey on media. Irrespective of the aired debate, the exact definition of the effects of media violence and its alteration to violent behaviors may be defined by critically understanding the cognitive behavior, and how information is processed, moved from one memory location to the other. Therefore, it is essential to understand the mental process involved during decoding processing and encoding information in human memory. Thus, the essay will critically elucidate on how human memory performs to help determine whether media violence has any significant effect on the violent behavior to its viewers.
According to Feldman, & Stephen, (2010), the encoding of information remains the ultimate concept through which we feed information to the brain. The input process may include visualization, hearing, smell, or touch. However, visualization and hearing remain to be the most effective and convenient means through which information is fed to human memory. Therefore, information is processed accordingly, with similar information-sharing a similar type of information. On the contrary, similar information and new information is rejoined together to add to the existing piece of information. Therefore, the small piece of information fed to human memory slowly helps in formulating one massive piece of information. According to Emanuel Tanay, a clinical professor and psychiatrist for more than 50 years (Kahana, et al., 2018), violence in the media has been increasing at a dangerous proportion. The media has shifted its traditional concepts of censoring the content in the quest to attract and increasing its grip to the consumers. Violence in media has been highly increased to attract its consumers without considering the side effects it is conveying to the users.
According to the research conducted by Kahana, et al., (2018), media violence is the leading propaganda and agent for promoting crime. “If you manufacture guns, you do not need to advertise them, since our media has that covered.” While the emphasis of this statement may not be taken into greater depths, the conveyed criminal activities in the media are capture and transferred from the sensory memory to short term memory. However, the repeated actions and activities of violent activities further sink the captured information to the longer-term memory, which affects the viewers’ behaviors in the long run. Most of the affected areas in human memory are the long term memory (LTM) due to its unlimited capacity on storage. Unlike short term memory (STM), which is limited to only seven plus or minus two items in processing, LTM has unlimited capacity, and most of the information stored in the LTM may be affected by what stimulates encourages the existence of the information in the long term memory.
Criminal activities are fueled by the violence we experience in media as a form of entertainment, without considering the repercussions. The mass shooting at Mississippi in 2017 may be deemed as terrorist activity, but taking a closer eye at the incident, it was evident that the actions were motivated by the violence we experience in media violence as a form of entertainment. The interview recording from the police department depicted the behavior patterns of the suspects and their high involvement of action movies, some of which were meant for self-defense. However, this translated into a coaching practice, ranging from the suitable weapon choice of use to executing the process.
Media violence has been termed as a new concept of promoting and increasing aggressive behaviors. According to the research conducted by Anderson, et al., (2017). Media violence has been responsible for the increasing rates of aggressive behaviors, especially tot the younger generation, due to the cross-culture behaviors shared via violence. For instance, aggressive behaviors depicted in media geared towards hardening a certain character in the movie, translates a similar impact to a young individual back at home, who is left to watch a movie on their own. Even though parental control in many media has been implemented to reduce the effects of aggressive behaviors, a lot has slipped through the hands, subjecting many young viewers to the violence, which reshape their behaviors.
On the contrary, aggressive behaviors in adults are far worse than those depicted by children. One of the typical results of increased crime and aggression is the prevalence of media violence, which reduces the feeling of helping others. Individuals subjected to a higher degree of media violence are psychologically affected. Most of them tend to lack compassion and the capacity to develop a sense of helping others in need. Therefore, the devastating effects slow start erupting, depicting the volatile side of human memory, and how media violence has damaged it, by reducing possible compassion and love for others. The research conducted by Fox, et al., (2017) revealed unequivocal evidence the media violence increases the likelihood of aggressive and violent behaviors. The effects of media violence, which may be depicted through music, video games, and television shows, depict an interrelated behavior, which may have immediate or long term effects on violent behaviors. The effects of media violence with lifelong devastating effects affect the long term memory storage, as it remains reserved for a longer period, which affects the victim’s behavior, resulting in auto violence, especially to those who cannot fully control the situation. Watching violent media programs causes the part of the human brain responsible for suppressive behavior to become less active. Therefore, this weakens the reaction of fighting against violent behaviors.
Terrorist activities across the world are on the horizon, despite the increasing fight against terrorism. Since the 9/11 incident, the world has had a series of improved terror and refined activities, that are becoming more cumbersome to detect. Even though most of the governments have heightened the fight on terrorism, media violence, which has been used to serve as an entertainment sector, has posed a series of threats and improved terrorist activities. Basing on the episodic memory information about an event that we have personally experienced. Therefore, the visual imagery collected can be used to drive and strengthen the criminal behaviors of a person. As technology is taking a rapid improvement pace, media violence is getting better in terms of accessibility, increasing the degree of its impact on the consumers. Thus, violent behaviors and terror activities are easily exercised and passed from one person to the other. The use of social media applications to conduct and coordinate terrorist activities is becoming popular, as the perpetrators use this platform to plan and execute the terror activities without any trace. However, the increased media violence in showing new concept that can be used to carry out terror activities are recorded in the episodic memory before they are store in the long term memory. Therefore, this creates long-term behavior of violent activities.
In the bottom line, media violence has profoundly affected the viewers’ behaviors in an array of elements, a concept that increases violence and criminal activities. For instance, media violence has affected the aggressive behavior of many viewers. Therefore, most of them develop a sense of resilience and aggression, a concept that alters their behaviors. Additionally, media violence promotes criminal activities, such as mass shootings, which are undoubtedly inspired by media violence that affects our psychology.
