ABSTRACT
In the public debate on aggression and violence, media inÀ uences are blamed by many people for the apparently increasing levels of aggression, especially among children and adolescents. A cursory and occasional sampling is suf¿ cient to convince the everyday observer that television programmes are full of aggressive episodes, often of a highly violent nature, that are easily accessible even to young viewers. The same is true for movies, comic books, and, in particular, video games. In addition, surveys regularly present alarming ¿ gures of the time that children from preschool age onwards spend using violent media. These observations lead many people to believe that the portrayal of violence in the media affects the level of aggression in society. Some critics even argue that media consumption in general, irrespective of its aggressive content, contributes to aggression and antisocial behaviour. At the same time, the claim that violent media contents cause users to become more aggressive has been vigorously disputed, not only by the media industry but also by some researchers in the ¿ eld.
