Citation

Krongard S, Tsay-Vogel M. Psychol. Pop. Media 2020; 9(2): 155-164.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2020, American Psychiatric Publishing)

DOI

10.1037/ppm0000224

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

[Correction Notice: An Erratum for this article was reported online in Psychology of Popular Media Culture on Apr 4 2019 (see record [rid]2019-18607-001[/rid]). In the article, there was an omission of acknowledgment in the author note. The following acknowledgment should appear: The authors would like to express their deepest appreciation to James Bie, Bonnie Dickson, Shao Shu, and Qiankun Zhong for their assistance in coding the media content for this study. All versions of this article have been corrected.]

Cultivation theory asserts that heavy exposure to universal themes on TV lead viewers to see the world in ways that parallel TV. This research applies cultivation theory to a contemporary context by considering portrayals of violence in online original TV series. In Study 1, a content analysis of commonly binge-watched online original TV programs revealed 5.9 violent instances per hour, generally characterized as explicit, serious, significant, graphic, and intentional. Moral justification of violence was rare; however, those who engaged in justified violence were frequently White perpetrators. While non-White females were more likely to be targets of sexual violence, non-White males were more likely to be perpetrators of sexual violence. Study 2 found that exposure to these commonly binge-watched online original TV programs was positively related to mean world perceptions and negatively related to kind world perceptions, suggesting that heavier viewers of these programs are more likely to view others as unkind and less likely to perceive them as altruistic. Implications for violence in online streaming TV are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved)

Language: en

Keywords

Television; Violence; cultivation; kind world; mean world; Morality; online streaming TV; Perpetrators; Reality; Sex Offenses; Social Perception; social reality; Streaming Technology; Television Viewing