Paul V. Olczak

Violent Video Games Induce an Affect Processing Bias

This study investigated the effects of violent video game play and trait hostility on attentional bias toward negatively valenced words. Following video game play, participants completed an emotional Stroop task. Results indicated greater Stroop interference for participants high in trait hostility and for participants playing violent video games. Implications of these findings are discussed with respect to current models of aggressive behavior.

The Effects of Extremely Violent Comic Books on Social Information Processing

This study investigated the effects of reading extremely violent comic books (EVCB) versus non-violent comic books (NVCB) on the interpretation of overt and relational ambiguous provocation situations. Two hundred forty-nine introductory psychology students read either EVCB or NVCB. After reading the comic books, participants read hypothetical stories in which overt or relational aggression occurred but the intent of the provocateur was ambiguous. After each story, participants were asked a series of questions about the provocateurs intent, potential retaliation toward the provocateur, and the provocateurs emotional state. Trait hostility was significantly related to hostile responding. Regardless of the type of aggression, participants reading EVCB responded more negatively than participants reading NVCB did. Males responded more negatively to the overt scenarios, whereas females responded more negatively to the relational scenarios. Results indicate that interpretation of ambiguous material appears to be affected by a number of variables, including gender, trait hostility, and violent media.

Violent Media Consumption and the Recognition of Dynamic Facial Expressions

This study assessed the speed of recognition of facial emotional expressions (happy and angry) as a function of violent media consumption. Color photos of calm facial expressions morphed to either an angry or a happy facial expression. Participants were asked to make a speeded identification of the emotion (happiness or anger) during the morph. Results indicated that, independent of trait aggressiveness, participants high in violent media consumption responded slower to depictions of happiness and faster to depictions of anger than participants low in violent media consumption. Implications of these findings are discussed with respect to current models of aggressive behavior.

Violent Comic Books and Perceptions of Ambiguous Provocation Situations

This study investigated the effects of reading very violent versus mildly violent comic books on the interpretation of ambiguous provocation situations, independent of trait hostility. 119 introductory psychology students read either a violent comic book, Curse of the Spawn, or a mildly violent comic book, Archie & Friends. After reading the comic books, participants read six short stories in which a child caused a negative event to happen to another child, but the intent of the peer causing this negative event was ambiguous. After each story, participants were asked a series of questions about the harmdoers intent, potential retaliation toward the harm-doer, and about the harmdoers emotional state. Responses were coded in terms of amount of negative and violent content. Results indicate that those male participants reading the violent comic books responded more negatively on the ambiguous provocation story questions than male participants reading the mildly violent comic books. For females, responding was primarily governed by trait hostility. These data suggest that hostile attributional bias may be influenced by gender, trait hostility, and exposure to violent media.

Violent comic books and judgments of relational aggression

This study investigated the effects of reading extremely violent versus mildly violent comic books on the interpretation of relational provocation situations. One hundred and seventeen introductory psychology students read either an extremely violent comic book or a mildly violent comic book. After reading the comic books, participants read five hypothetical stories in which a child, caused a relationally aggressive event to occur to another child, but the intent of the provocateur was ambiguous. After each story, participants were asked a series of questions about the provocateur’s intent; potential retaliation toward the provocateur; and the provocateur’s emotional state. Responses were coded in terms of amount of negative and violent content. Results indicated that participants reading the extremely violent comic books ascribed more hostile intent to the provocateur, suggested more retaliation toward the provocateur, and attributed a more negative emotional state to the provocateur than participants reading the mildly violent comic book. These data suggest that social information processing of relationally aggressive situations is influenced by violent comic books, even if the comic books do not contain themes of relational aggression.

Psychosocial maturity and the forming of impressions

Erikson’s concept of psychosocial maturity (PSM), assessed by scores on the Inventory of Psychosocial Development, was related to interpersonal behavior in a person perception experiment. This personality variable was found to moderate ratings of others in the standard impression-formation paradigm. Results indicated that high-PSM individuals were more extreme in their responses to social stimuli than were low-PSM individuals, but only for the middle-ranged stimuli. The results were discussed in terms of the potential mechanisms by which PSM affects the forming of impressions.