Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

Availability

Open Access Thesis

Keywords

Violence in video games; Sexual harassment; Harassment; Sexism;

Abstract

Previous research has suggested a positive relationship between video game play and negative outcomes, with the APA going so far as to publish a press release on the negative effects of violent media (APA, 2005, 2015a, 2015b; Anderson et al., 2010; Kepes et al., 2017). However, critics argue that these results are marred by publication bias and are overstated (Ferguson, 2007; Ferguson et al., 2020; Hilgard et al., 2017). The current study examined the relationship between the amount of time participants played video games and engaged in sexual and general harassment, and examined whether exposure to video game violence, hostile sexism, and benevolent sexism moderated this relationship, with the amount of time participants spend chatting online as a covariate. When participants were exposed to high levels of video game violence, but had low or average levels of hostile sexism, the more hours they played, the less sexual harassment they reported (self-rated perpetration). When participants had high levels of exposure to video game violence, regardless of their level of benevolent sexism, the more hours they played, the less sexual harassment they reported. When participants reported less exposure to video game violence, regardless of how much hostile or benevolent sexism they reported, the more hours they played, the greater general harassment they reported. Future research should focus on individual differences, especially since the relationship between violent video game play and negative outcomes are not as clear as they once seemed.

Year of Submission

2021

Degree Name

Master of Arts

Department

Department of Psychology

First Advisor

Nicholas Schwab, Chair, Thesis Committee

Date Original

12-2021

Object Description

1 PDF file (xii, 128 pages)

Language

en

File Format

application/pdf

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