Session 7: Sociocultural Explanations
of violence
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Evaluate sociocultural explanations of violence
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7.
Is violence ever justified?
How old do you think the youngest murderer
ever was?
Give explanations of terrorism.
What do you think are the reasons for school
shootings?
Will there ever be a nuclear war?
Are humans less or more violent than we
used to be?
Why does violence sell?
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Violence: An aggressive act in which the perpetrator
abuses individuals indirectly or directly (IB Textbook)
“The intentional use of physical force or power,
threatened or actual against oneself, another person,
or against a group or community, which either results
in or has a high likelihood of resulting in injury,
death, psychological harm, maldevelopment or
deprivation (World Health Organisation
Examples of violence: Murder, bullying, war,
genocide, domestic violence, suicide
Social psychologists focus on social rules and
roles, how groups affects attitudes and behaviour,
why people obey authority, and how each of us is
affected by other people
Cultural psychologists examine how cultural rules
and values – both explicit and implicit – affect
people’s development, behaviour and feelings
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There are many sociocultural explanations for
origins of violence but we will focus on just
two:
1. Social learning theory
2. Deindividuation theory
1. Social learning theory as an explanation for
origin of violence (Bandura, 1977)
Write down everything you can remember
about social learning theory
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Suggested people learn to behave violently
(including violent attitude and norms)
through direct experiences and through
observing models
SLT focuses on observational learning and
modeling.
Theory proposes that children learn to be
violent due to exposure to violent models &
because this violent behaviour is rewarded
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SLT has been applied to explain the
development of aggression &
intergenerational transmission of violence
through a process of socialisation
◦ Children are influenced by socialisation factors such
as the family, the immediate environment including
peers & the media
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Social learning can be:
◦ direct (via instructions/explicitly teaching)
◦ Indirect (e.g. observing role models)
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Children who grow up in violent families and
neighbourhoods where they watch models use
violence & obtain benefits from it (e.g. power)
may be likely to see violence as a legitimate
means to get what they want or exert power over
other people.
Support for this proposition comes from the
results of Bandura & Ross’ classic 1961 Bobo doll
study
Two aims:
1.
To investigate whether children would imitate
aggression modeled by an adult
2.
To see if children were more likely to imitate
same sex models
Participants
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72 children aged 3-6 years
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36 boys and 36 girls
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Children were divided into 3 groups
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Groups were matched with regards to levels of
aggression based on an evaluation
from parents and teachers
Condition
Description
Aggressive
Model
Exposed to adult models who showed aggression by bashing an inflatable
“Bobo” doll
Non-aggressive
model
Observed a non-aggressive adult who assembled toys for 10 minutes
Control
No model observed
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After watching the models, the children were
placed in a room with toys
Very soon, they were taken out of the room,
being told that these toys were for other
children and were then put into a room with
the Bobo doll
Results
 Children who had observed the aggressive
model were significantly more aggressiveboth verbally and physically- towards the
Bobo doll
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According to Bandura, the theory of social
learning theory was demonstrated in the
study, since the children showed signs of
observational learning
Results
 Bandura also observed that girls were more likely
to imitate verbal aggression and boys were more
likely to imitate physical aggression
 When boys observed women bashing the Bobo
doll, they often made comments like “ladies
shouldn’t do that!”
 Children were more likely to imitate same-sex
models
Low Ecological Validity
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Experiment has been criticised for low ecological validity.
Not only was the study carried out in a laboratory, there
were other factors which made the situation artificial:
Only a brief encounter with the model
Children were intentionally frustrated after they were put
in toy room
Could be argued study does little to demonstrate what
happens if a child is repeatedly exposed to aggressive
parents or violence on television
Does aggression against a Bob doll indicate learned
aggression in general or is it highly specific to this
situation
Other methodological issues
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Aggression modeled by adults was not
completely standardised meaning children may
have observed slight differences in aggression
displayed
Despite attempts to match participants on levels
of aggression across groups, the evaluations
were based on observations from teachers and
parent which may not be accurate or reliable.
Question of demand characteristics: children may
have acted aggressively because they thought it
would please the researcher
Ethics
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Use of young children is ethically
questionable
Observing adult strangers act in an
aggressive manner may have been
frightening for children
Teaching aggressive behaviour to children
also questionable. No guarantee that if
aggressive behaviour was learned that it
would be reversible
Qualitative study on girlfriend abuse among violent male youth in Canada
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Aim: to explore how young girlfriend abusers used violence to construct
their masculinity. Study focused on how families and peer groups
contributed to learning and identification with violent norms as part of
establishing a masculine gender role
Procedure:
 Purposeful sample of 30 abusive adolescent males from a large city in
Canada
 All had pro-abusive beliefs, masculine ideals and admitted to using
violence towards their girlfriends
 Mean age of boys was 15.6 years.
 6 belonged to an ethnic minority & rest were white
 Many were gang members and most had dropped out of school early
 Semi-structured interviews were used to collect data
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Adolescents backgrounds had similar features.
They had all been exposed to violent behaviour
in the family and they saw this as justified and
even necessary
Their fathers all had rigid authoritarian beliefs
(e.g. rigid gender roles) & all used violence to
control family members or defend their honour
All were abusive and used physical and sexual
violence for same reasons as their fathers
Boys said they had the right to use violence if
girlfriends did not behave
In some cases, fathers had given instructions on
how to abuse women in particular situations
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Used a small and purposive sample so it is
not possible to generalise
Qualitative data gave in-depth insight into
how the violent adolescents experienced the
use of violence themselves
Practical applications: research could be a
starting point to design interventions to
prevent violence, such as by providing
positive role models (mentoring) as well as
education and job opportunities
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Eron (1986): Found a positive correlation
between number of hours of violence
watched on television at the age of 8 and the
level of aggression they demonstrated as
teenagers, as well as the number of criminal
acts as adults
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Charlton et al (2002)
Conducted a natural experiment
Island of St Helena in the Atlantic Ocean
Aim:
 to investigate whether children would exhibit more
aggressive behaviour after the introduction to the island in
1995
Procedure:
 children aged 3-8 were observed before and after the
introduction of television
 Content analysis of TV showed level of violence on
television matched what children in UK generally exposed
to
 Behaviour observed through the use of video cameras that
were set up in the playgrounds of 2 primary schools on the
island
 Researchers also conducted
interviews with teachers,
parents and some of the older
children
Results:
 Analysis of hundreds of hours of videotape,
backed up by interview data showed there
was no increase in aggressive or anti-social
behaviour.
 This was also the case after five years
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Parents and teachers said that antisocial
behaviour was not accepted on the island
and that there was a high degree of social
control in the community. Shows that people
may learn aggressive behaviour but may not
exhibit it for different reasons.
Social and cultural factors play a role in what
behaviours are acceptable, so even though
children had no doubt learned
aggressive behaviour,
they did not show it.
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This study does not necessarily disprove
SLT but rather conflicts with results from
the Bobo doll study
In relation to SLT it may be explained that
children from St Helena were not
motivated to imitate the behaviour due to
the norms of their society
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High ecological validity: study
investigated a naturally occurring event
as opposed to an artificial task
Results of study do not question SLT but
rather the results of Bandura and Ross
(1961). Results also support the idea that
people must be motivated to imitate
behaviour.
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Empirical evidence that supports theory i.e. Bandura
(1961), Totten (2003)
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Social norms of violence can be transmitted from
parents to children as predicted by SLT
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SLT can be used to explain why adolescents use
violence in marginalised social peer groups because it
pays off in the form of status (reinforcement)
Theory has practical applications for forming violence
intervention programmes i.e. mentoring programmes
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SLT cannot explain how structural factors
such as poverty contribute to establishing
norms of male superiority
Theory does not take individual differences
into account like intelligence and personality
Neglects biological factors. Some people may
be more prone to violence due to genetic
inheritance/brain damage
2. Deindividuation Theory
"Creates
a unique psychological state in
which behaviour comes under the control of
immediate situational demands and
biological, hormonal urges. With inner
restraints suspended behaviour is totally
under external situational control; outer
dominates inner"
- Zimbardo
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According to the theory deindividuation is a
psychological state aroused when individuals join
crowds or large groups
State is characterised by diminished awareness of
self and individuality
Being in a large group provides a degree of
anonymity- allows individual to avoid
responsibility for actions
Hogg and Vaughan (2008) define deindividuation
as: ‘a process whereby people lose their sense of
socialised identity and engage in unsocialised,
often antisocial behaviours’.
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1.
2.
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There are three key factors for
deindividuation to occur:
Anonymity
Group Size
Arousal
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Female undergraduate students asked to give electric
shocks to another student to “aid learning”
½ participants wore bulky lab coats & hoods that hid their
faces. They were spoken to in groups and never referred
to by name.
Other ½ wore their own clothes, were given large name
tags to wear and were introduced to each other by name.
Could also see each other when seated at shock machines
Participants told something about learner prior to
experiment either:
“she is honest, sincere and warm”
Or
“she is conceited and critical”
Results
 Hooded participants administered twice as many
shocks & amount of shocks did not vaary
according to the description of learner
 Participants wearing name-tags related the
amount of shock to the description given
Conclusions
 Those whose identity had been obscured more
likely to give harsher punishment
 Deindividuation seemed to lowered their sense of
self-consciousness and sense of accountability
for behaviour
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Low ecological validity. Questionable whether
results would be seen in routine everyday
experiences
There is, however, evidence that this reflects
what happens in extreme political unrest or in
the case of torture (Haritos-Fatouros, 2003)
Ethical concerns that participants may have
been subjected to undue stress which may
have had a long term impact
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In order to address issue of ecological validity
Diener carried out a naturalistic observation
on children at Halloween
Aim: to see if deindividuation had an effect
on amount of candy children took when trick
or treating
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One group of children asked for names and
addresses and other were not.
Some were in costumes, some were not
Children were encouraged to take a single sweet
Results
 Those who were individuated by providing their name
took more than the single sweet in 8% of cases
 Those who were deinviduated by being dressed in a
Halloween costume took more than one sweet in 80%
of cases
Conclusion: supports theory of deindividuation
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Could explain problems with trolling and
cyberbullying
Often people behave in a way that is more
extreme online than they would in real life
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Empirical evidence that supports theory i.e.
Zimbardo, Diener
Could explain violence like football
hooliganism, riots etc
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Deindividuation theory cannot explain how structural
factors such as poverty contribute to violence
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Cannot explain acts of violence when deindividuation
is not present- only explains one type of violence?
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Theory does not take individual differences into
account like intelligence and personality
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Neglects biological factors. Some people may be
more prone to violence due to genetic
inheritance/brain damage
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Violence is complex and sociocultural
explanations alone cannot fully explain
violent behaviour.
Need to take into account other factors such
as biology and cognition
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Each of you will be assigned one of the
biological explanations of violence to learn
You will then be asked to share with the
group