The effects of 3 (aggressive vs neutral vs prosocial) × 2 (real life vs cartoon) television programs on altruistic donating to charity of 120 8- to 10-yr.-olds were examined on both an immediate test and a 1-wk. retest. On the immediate test, exposure to aggressive television programs led to significantly less donating behavior than did exposure to neutral or prosocial programs. A negative relationship was found between the number of hours, averaged across viewing conditions, children reported they watched TV per week and the number of tokens they donated.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
BanduraA.Aggression: A social learning analysis. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1973.
2.
ComstockG.ChaffebS.KatzmanN.McCombsM.RobertsD.Television and human behavior. New York: Columbia Univer. Press, 1978.
3.
LaMarshJ.Report of the Royal commission on violence in the communications industry. Vol. 5 and 6. Toronto: Queen's Printer for Ontario, 1977.
4.
MurrayJ. P.KippaxS.From the early window to the late night show, international trends in the study of television's impact on children and adults. In BerkowitzL. (Ed.), Advances in experimental social psychology. Vol. 12. New York: Academic Press, 1979. Pp. 253–320.
5.
RushtonJ. P.Generosity in children: Immediate and long-term effects of modeling, preaching, and moral judgment. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1975, 31, 459–466.
6.
RushtonJ. P.Socialization and the altruistic behavior of children. Psychological Bulletin, 1976, 83, 898–913.
7.
RushtonJ. P.Television and prosocial behavior. In Report of the Royal commission on violence in the communications industry. Vol. 5. Learning from the media. Toronto: Queen's Printer for Ontario, 1977. Pp. 31–54.
8.
RushtonJ. P.The effects of prosocial television and film material on the behavior of viewers. In BerkowitzL. (Ed.), Advances in experimental social psychology. Vol. 12. New York: Academic Press, 1979. Pp. 321–351.
9.
RushtonJ. P.Altruism, socialization, and society. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1980.
10.
RushtonJ. P.TeachmanG.The effects of positive reinforcement, attributions, and punishment on model induced altruism in children. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 1978, 4, 322–325.
11.
RushtonJ. P.WienerJ.Altruism and cognitive development in children. British Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 1975, 14, 341–349.
