1. Television, Films and Video games
VIOLENCE IN THE MEDIA

2. TELEVISION PROGRAMMES
• It has been found that cartoon comic violence can lead to young children having nightmares
and have a negative affect on their sleeping patterns.
• Excessive TV watching in childhood and adolescence (8+ hours a day) is associated with an
increased risk of criminal convictions and anti-social behaviour in young adults.
• TV programmes such as Looney tunes, Scooby Doo and Pokemon have been criticised for their
flippant use of violence and the more sinister side to their programmes which most children and
parents would disregard.
• However, children from a young age learn from what they see and hear and so exposing them
to these programmes (in excess) could harm them and distort their view on the world in their
later years.
• There is currently a debate into whether the TV programme ‘Luther’, which is shown at 9pm on
BBC 1, is too violent for TV. This shows that viewers and critics are starting to question
broadcasters and whether they are pushing the limits of violence that is able to be shown.

3. FILM
• 90% of all movies contain some type of violence.
• Children grow up watching superhero films, such as Spiderman, The Avengers and Superman.
They see the superheroes fight against the ‘bad’ people and escape unhurt and sometimes
without a scratch.
• This means that children are more likely to copy or imitate the violence they see ‘good guys’ use
because they believe that they are invincible.
• Films such as Cars 2, Monsters inc and Despicable me have been criticised and questioned as
to whether they are too violent for children.
• It is hard to find a level of violence that is acceptable for children to see and the difference
between a level of violence that could be harmful if consumed in excess.
• Many Disney films have recently been found to have a more sinister and disturbing meaning to
them, to that of what we first thought. The Lion King’s hidden message is that in life, in order for
you to be successful, other people will have to pay.

4. VIDEO GAMES
• The connection between video games and real life violence is still unclear and the level to which
video games affect viewers aggression levels is unsure.
• 68% of video games contain violence.
• Most children start playing video games around the age of 4.
• Children start to become desensitized to violence after excessive consumption of video game
violence.
• Gunman, Adam Lanza, who shot 20 children and 6 teachers in Newton, was supposedly found to
have been motivated by violent video games. This shows the extreme power that video games can
have.
• However, there are still articles disagreeing with these statements and saying that there is no
correlation between violent video games and aggression levels.