Deck 7: Theories of Media and Social Learning

Question 1

Using imitation to argue significant media effects is doomed to failure because ______.

A) imitation is difficult to observe
B) the modeling effects are often masked in imitation
C) its serious occurrences are relatively few
D) advertising proves that imitation works

Answer 1

C

Question 2

Aggressive behavior related to the observation of rewarded media violence is an example of _______.

A) environmental incentive
B) inhibitory effects
C) disinhibitory effects
D) behavioral hierarchies

Answer 2

C

Question 3

Inhibitory effects are likely to occur when an observer ______.

A) sees the negative consequences of some observed behavior
B) sees only encouraged behavior
C) is rewarded sufficiently in the environment
D) is a young child

Answer 3

A

Question 4

Viewers learn novel responses through simple observation of those responses. Whether the response is inhibited or disinhibited however, is a function of the _____.

A) behavioral hierarchy
B) amount of peer pressure
C) valence of the vicarious reinforcement
D) degree of social learning

Question 5

The idea that the simple viewing of televised violence can reduce our aggressive drive is called ______.

A) reductionism
B) desensitization
C) inhibitory effects
D) catharsis

Question 6

A simple summary of the limited-effects findings on the effects of TV violence is that viewing of violent programming normally ___.

A) influences some types of children under certain circumstances
B) has no influence on average children
C) has a uniform and moderately bad influence on most children
D) has a random influence on some types of children

Question 7

The researcher most associated with the development of social cognitive theory is _______.

A) Albert Bandura
B) Clyde Wasserman
C) Leonard Berkowitz
D) Joseph Klapper

Question 8

Big Bird on Sesame Street is given a prize because he was able to count to ten. This is an example of an effort to teach children to count by using _________.

A) delayed gratification
B) vicarious reinforcement
C) conditioned response
D) sublimation

Question 9

A relatively recently developed theory of media violence effects tries to integrate several related of aggression. This theory is the ____.

A) General Aggression Model
B) Cognitive Development Model
C) Catharsis Model
D) Empowered-Child Model

Question 10

Sociologist Urie Bronfenbrenner said that American backyards were growing smaller and school yards growing bigger, meaning ____.

A) the country was becoming more suburbanized
B) the country was becoming more urban
C) young people were being socialized both at home and in school
D) young people were increasingly being socialized away from parents' influence

Question 11

The 1969 Surgeon General's Scientific Advisory Committee on Television and Social Behavior concluded that ______.

A) only some TV program affected some kids some of the time
B) As long as parents were diligent, they had little to fear from their kids viewing TV violence
C) the causal link between media violence and viewer aggression was not sufficiently demonstrated to warrant action
D) the causal link between media violence and viewer aggression was sufficiently demonstrated to warrant action

Question 12

Where some research did indeed show a reduction in young people's levels of aggression after viewing TV violence, the more likely cause was ________ rather than catharsis.

A) disinhibitory effects
B) inhibitory effects
C) sublimation
D) Behavioural hierarchy

Question 13

_______ is the direct mechanical reproduction of behavior.

A) Vicarious reinforcement
B) Social learning
C) Identification
D) Imitation

Question 14

Media portrayals of violence are almost always in some narrative context, and that context provides information telling viewers when and against whom violence is acceptable. As such, they contain ______.

A) aggressive cues
B) inhibitory power
C) behavioral hierarchies
D) reinforcement contingencies

Question 15

The General Aggression Model assumes that social behavior depends on people's understanding of events in the present environment, including their interpretation of these events, beliefs about typical ways of responding to such events, perceived competencies for responding in different ways, and ________.

A) the way they were raised
B) what their culture suggests is appropriate
C) expectations regarding likely outcomes
D) if they are experiencing sublimation

Question 16

One part of the General Aggression Model is the episode-when a person is in a social situation and can behave either with or without aggression toward another.

Question 17

The General Aggression Model includes person factors that will influence a person's likely display of aggression, for example an insult might increase the likelihood of aggression; the presence of your parents might decrease it.

Question 18

Media enter the General Aggression Model as part of a person's developmental/personality processes.

Question 19

The 1969 Surgeon General's Scientific Advisory Committee on Television and Social Behavior definitively resolved the question of media violence's impact on viewer aggression.

Question 20

After watching Spike TV's Ultimate Fighting Championship, 23 Connecticut teens engage in a backyard slugfest/tournament mimicking what they saw on the screen. This is identification.

Question 21

After seeing a TV character arrested for beating up his friend, you are less likely to engage in similar behavior because you have experienced catharsis.

Question 22

Social cognitive theory argues that observers can acquire symbolic representations of observed behavior.

Question 23

Operant learning theory asserts that people learn new behaviors when they are presented with stimuli, make a response to those stimuli, and have those responses reinforced either positively or negatively.

Question 24

Social cognition through the use of media representations operates in one or more of three ways, behavioral hierarchy, inhibitory effects, and disinhibitory effects.

Question 25

Although observational learning can occur in the absence of any reinforcement, whether observers actually engage in that learned behavior is a function of the reinforcement contingencies they associate with it.

Question 26

Social prompting describes a situation when sufficient incentive is present in the environment to move a behavior up the hierarchy to a point where we choose it from among a number of alternatives.

Question 27

Inhibition is the mitigation or reduction of anxious physiological arousal in response to depictions of violence, both mediated and real-world, as the result of habitual consumption of mediated violence.

Question 28

Media aggression that viewers see as justified produces greater levels of modeling, and unjustified media violence results in less viewer aggression.

Question 29

The link between media violence and subsequent aggression has more scientific support than that of the relationship between self-examination and early detection of breast cancer.

Question 30

Sublimation is another name for catharsis.