This study develops and validates the Moral Interpretation of Interpersonal Violence (MIIV) Scale. One hundred fifty-eight children responded to 12 stories in which a perpetrator performed either justified or unjustified violence. Children were asked to report how right or wrong they perceived the violence to be and to provide reasons for their responses. Principal components analysis was used to reduce the 12 stories to a smaller set that had higher internal consistency and that correlated with the Sociomoral Reflection Measure—Short Form (SRM-SF). The study also investigated how viewing television violence was related to the MIIV. Children who watched a lot of fantasy violence judged justified violence as less wrong, whereas children who watched a lot of realistic violence judged justified violence as more wrong. In addition, children who watched more fantasy violence and those who watched more realistic violence used less advanced moral reasoning strategies in explaining their judgments.
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