Brad J Bushman

The Ohio State University | OSU · School of Communication

Although video games can teach various skills, violent video games also teach players how to behave more aggressively. Hundreds of studies using different methodologies have shown that violent video games can increase aggressive thoughts, feelings, and behavior and can decrease empathy and prosociality. Longitudinal studies have found that habitual...

Alcohol, tobacco, and firearm use are the root causes of disability and mortality in the United States. The use of these products in adolescence has considerable impacts on immediate and lifelong health. Adolescents have been the key targets of alcohol, tobacco, and firearm companies because of the potential to shape brand alliances and lifetime us...

Glowacki's work meshes well with our view of human nature as having evolved to use culture to improve survival and reproduction. Peace is a cultural achievement, requiring advances in social organization and control, including leaders who can implement policies to benefit the group, third-party mediation, and intergroup cooperation. Cultural advanc...

Gun violence in the USA is a documented public health crisis. Publicly accessible data from Twitter posts can be used to rapidly capture and describe the public's recent conversations about guns. Because these gun-related conversations change rapidly, it is important to provide regularly updated information on them. Twitter posts containing gun-rel...

Videogames, including smartphone app games, can be effective teachers. Meta-analytic reviews find that prosocial media can increase empathy and prosocial behavior. We developed a prosocial smartphone app game, Random App of Kindness (RAKi), using theoretically informed empathy-building practices, in the hopes of increasing empathy and prosocial beh...

To address a gap in the literature regarding the development of youth disclosure across the transition to adolescence, the current research uses a cohort-sequential approach to study youth disclosure from middle childhood through adolescence. Longitudinal data from three cohorts of parents were utilized (N = 1359; children at T1 were in grades 2 [M...

Importance: Firearms are the leading cause of death for children in the US. It is therefore crucial to identify effective ways to reduce firearm injuries among children. Objective: To test the effectiveness of a gun safety video vs a car safety video on decreasing unsafe behaviors around real guns after exposure to a violent movie with vs withou...

We respond to the Devilly et al. (2023) comment about our article (Bushman& Anderson, 2021). Specifically, we point out 20 false claims they make about our article and explain why these claims are false.

One of the oldest scientific theories of human aggression is the frustration-aggression hypothesis, advanced in 1939. Although this theory has received considerable empirical support and is alive and well today, its underlying mechanisms have not been adequately explored. In this article, we examine major findings and concepts from extant psycholog...

Social psychology findings have fared poorly in multi-site replication attempts. This article considers and evaluates multiple factors that may contribute to such failures, other than the "crisis" assumption that most of the field's published research is so badly flawed that it should be dismissed wholesale. Low engagement by participants may reduc...

Objective: Callousness has been identified as a key driver of aggressive and violent behavior from childhood into early adulthood. Although previous research has underscored the importance of the parenting environment in contributing to the development of youth callousness, findings have generally been confined to the between-individual level and...

We review the history of violence as transmitted through media with particular attention to firearms. We take a broad perspective on the role of media and how the human brain has evolved to receive and interpret both auditory and visual media. However, it is the cultural evolution of both media and violence that has led to the current widespread de...

Social psychology findings have fared poorly in multi-site replication attempts. This article considers and evaluates multiple factors that may contribute to such failures, other than the "crisis" assumption that most of the field's published research is so badly flawed that it should be dismissed wholesale. Low engagement by participants may reduc...

Seeking to understand and reduce partisan hostility, we propose that humans evolved to benefit from cultural societies. Societies perform two crucial tasks, which have grown apart and are now championed by political opponents: (1) amassing resources, and (2) distributing resources. The political right focuses on amassing resources, whereas the poli...

Multisite (multilab/many-lab) replications have emerged as a popular way of verifying prior research findings, but their record in social psychology has prompted distrust of the field and a sense of crisis. We review all 36 multisite social-psychology replications (plus three articles reporting multiple ministudies). We start by assuming that both...

The Tangram Help/Hurt Task (THHT) allows participants to help another participant win a prize (by assigning them easy tangrams), to hurt another participant by preventing them from winning the prize (by assigning them difficult tangrams), or to do neither (by assigning them medium tangrams) in offline or online studies. Consistent with calls for co...

Mindfulness is a focused attention to and acceptance of present experiences. Although several reliable and valid multi-item measures of trait mindfulness exist, researchers may sometimes want a short and quick measure of mindfulness. In this project, we developed and validated the Single-Item Mindfulness Scale (SIMS) to assess trait mindfulness. We...

Past research finds that a majority of gun and non-gun owners support key gun safety policies, yet gun owners tend to underestimate other gun owners’ support for these policies. We predicted that these misperceptions of support might lead gun owners to view non-gun owners as being less similar to themselves, which might undermine intergroup coopera...

In an effort to stave off racial and geographic prejudices, The World Health Organization (WHO) has advised against naming pathogens for geographic regions. Despite this, some media reports, and prominent politicians, have persisted in calling the coronavirus the “Chinese Virus,” or some variant thereof. In this pre-registered online experiment (N...

Early research on body positions suggested that engaging in certain nonverbal displays can lead to changes in self-report, behavioral, and physiological dependent variables. Still, there has been intense criticism regarding the replicability of these effects. To determine what effects are valid, we conducted a meta-analytic review on body position...

Exposure to violent video games can cause a wide array of harmful consequences to adolescents. This study shows preliminary evidence of the effectiveness of a brief intervention to decrease aggression and increase self-control following exposure to a violent video game. Participants (157 high-school students; age range: 13–19) were randomly assigne...

Of course, using a weapon can make aggressive acts more lethal. But can simply seeing a weapon increase aggression? The available research evidence indicates that the answer is “yes.” The weapons effect is a behavioral phenomenon in which the mere presence of a weapon can increase aggression. This chapter reviews the history of the weapons effect a...

Women are often depicted as sex objects rather than as human beings in the media (e.g., magazines, television programs, films, and video games). Theoretically, media de-pictions of females as sex objects could lead to negative attitudes and even aggressive behavior toward them in the real world. Using the General Aggression Model (Anderson & Bushma...

Over the last half-century, many professional and scientific organizations have issued statements about the harmful effects of violent media on children. Most pediatricians, media researchers, and parents also believe that violent media can be harmful. Although most studies report significant violent media effects, some report null effects. In this...

In this reply to Hilgard’s 2021 criticisms of the Hasan et al. (2013) study, we show that his use of the Maximal Positive Controls methodology was inappropriately implemented for four main reasons: (1) he had participants watch a film of video gameplay (we had participants actively play video games), (2) his videos were about 2 minutes and 15 secon...

Religious fundamentalism is a globally relevant and growing phenomenon. This study examined the interaction between religious fundamentalism and intrinsic religiosity, as it relates to spiritual well-being and social connectedness. These phenomena were explored among Muslims living in Iran, where a fundamentalist orientation is prevalent. Religious...

In this study, we examine whether youth who are exposed to more weapons violence are subsequently more likely to behave violently with weapons. We use data collected with a 3‐cohort, 4‐wave, 10‐year longitudinal study of 426 high‐risk youth from Flint, Michigan, who were second, fourth, or ninth‐graders in 2006–2007. The data were obtained from ind...

This meta-analytic review examines the link between narcissism and aggression, and whether the link is stronger under provocation conditions. A total of 437 independent studies were located, which included 123,043 participants. Narcissism was related to both aggression (r = .26, [.24, .28]) and violence (r = .23, [.18, .27]). As expected, the narci...

This White Paper summarizes the authors' discussion regarding objectionable content for the University of Houston (UH) Research Team to outline a strategy for building an extensive repository of online videos to support research into automated multimodal approaches to detect objectionable content. The workshop focused on defining what harmful conte...

Video game depictions of racial minorities are often stereotyped and likely to activate aggressive schema and behaviors. Using the theoretical framework of Proteus Effect, we manipulated the avatar race (White or Black) of main and enemy characters in a video game as well as the race of a partner in an aggressive behavior task. This allows for a mo...

Importance Despite broad public support for gun safety policies, minimal policy implementation has occurred. Objective To investigate factors that encourage greater private support for and public action on gun safety policy. Design, Setting, and Participants Three studies were conducted: a public opinion survey (Study 1) was conducted from Januar...

The general aggression model, or GAM for short, is a metatheory for understanding the roots of aggression. The GAM is especially useful for understanding how exposure to violent media can increase aggression. In the GAM, personal and situational variables independently and interactively influence a person's internal states (cognition, affect, arous...

The study of aggressive driving is an important step in the reduction of (often fatal) crashes due to this behavior. However, even though various measures of aggressive driver behavior have been proposed, a more thorough examination of what the driving public perceives as aggressive driving behavior can be performed. A nationally representative sam...

Background: The prefrontal cortex is crucial for top-down regulation of aggression, but the neural underpinnings of aggression are still poorly understood. Past research showed the transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) over the ventrolateral prefrontal cortex (VLPFC) modulates aggression following exposure to risk factors for aggression (...

Importance Among resource-rich countries, the United States has the highest rate of child mortality by unintentional firearm use. Objective To test whether children’s exposure to violent video games increases dangerous behavior around firearms. Design, Setting, and Participants This randomized clinical trial was set in a university laboratory and...

Laboratory measures play an important role in the study of aggression because they allow researchers to make causal inferences. However, these measures have also been criticized. In particular, the competitive reaction time task (CRTT) has been criticized for allowing aggression to be operationalized in multiple ways, leaving it susceptible to “p‐h...

Negative consequences of video games have been a concern since their inception. However, one under‐researched area is the potential negative effects of sexualized video game content on players. This study analyzed the consequences of sexualized video game content on online sexual harassment against male and female targets. We controlled for a numbe...

There is emerging evidence that Omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) supplements can decrease aggression. However, experimental studies with adults from non-specific populations are scarce. We hypothesized that Omega-3 supplements would decrease self-reported aggression among non-clinical participants. In a double-blind randomized trial, two...

Guns are associated with aggression. A landmark 1967 study showed that simply seeing a gun can increase aggression—called the “weapons effect.” This meta-analysis integrates the findings of weapons effect studies conducted from 1967 to 2017. It includes 162 effect-size estimates from 78 independent studies involving 7,668 participants. The theoreti...

Although adolescents around the world play video games, little is known about their longitudinal effects on adolescents from Eastern countries. This large longitudinal violent video game study has 4 strengths. First, it is the first longitudinal study conducted with Chinese adolescents. Second, it examines moral disengagement as a possible mediatin...

When shooting a gun at a human target, firearms training instructors teach individuals to shoot for the upper torso because it is the largest lethal target on the human body. In contrast, violent first‐person shooter (FPS) video games reward players for headshots. The head is the smallest lethal target, and requires careful aim to hit. In this expe...

https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/144599/2/ab21766_am.pdf

In June 2015, the U.S. Department of the Treasury announced that a woman would replace Hamilton on the $10 bill. In April 2016, it announced that Harriet Tubman would replace Andrew Jackson on the $20 bill, instead. After each announcement, we surveyed nationally representative samples of American adults and asked them what they thought of these pr...

The General Aggression Model (GAM) is a meta‐theory that considers the role of personal and situational variables on aggressive behavior, ranging from the biological to the cultural. Possible mediating variables include internal states (e.g., aggressive thoughts, angry feelings, increased physiological arousal) and the results of appraisal and deci...

Although violent entertainment has existed for centuries, the media have made it more accessible than ever before. In modern societies, people are immersed in media, like fish in water. Using hand-held devices, people can consume media just about anywhere they want, anytime they want. Moreover, violence is a common theme in the media, and research...

Nostalgia, a sentimental longing for the past, is a self-relevant and social emotion. Nostalgia proneness is associated with alleviation of distress or instability (e.g., neuroticism). Although nostalgia proneness is heritable, the specific molecular contributors to this heritability are unknown. We focused on a polymorphism in the promoter of the...

Aggressive drivers can make driving dangerous. Over 50% of traffic fatalities are caused by aggressive driving. This research tests whether narcissists are more aggressive drivers than other individuals. Narcissists think they are special people who deserve special treatment. When they don’t get the special treatment they think they deserve, narcis...

Aggression and violence levels generally increase as one moves closer to the equator, but why? We developed a new theoretical model, CLimate, Aggression, and Self-control in Humans (CLASH; van Lange, Rinderu, & Bushman, 2017b, 2017c), to understand differences within and between countries in aggression and violence in terms of differences in climat...

For many years, the conventional wisdom was that most acts of aggression and violence stem from insecurities and low self-esteem. The possibility that some mass shooters have low self-esteem, low self-worth, or painful personal insecurities should not lead us to overlook another more likely possibility: that a significant number of mass shooters ma...

In discussions about guns, one factor rarely considered is the fact that merely seeing a gun can increase aggression. This effect—called the “weapons effect”—was first demonstrated in a 1967 study, and has been replicated many times since then. The present experiment used a driving simulator to provide a novel test of the weapons effect. One of the...

Violence in screen entertainment media (ie, television, film, video games, and the Internet), defined as depictions of characters (or players) trying to physically harm other characters (or players), is ubiquitous. The Workgroup on Media Violence and Violent Video Games reviewed numerous meta-analyses and other relevant research from the past 60 ye...

Empathy involves feeling compassion for others and imagining how they feel. In this article, we develop and validate the Single Item Trait Empathy Scale (SITES), which contains only one item that takes seconds to complete. In seven studies (N=5,724), the SITES was found to be both reliable and valid. It correlated in expected ways with a wide varie...

Importance More US children die by accidental gun use than children in other developed countries. One factor that can influence children’s interest in guns is exposure to media containing guns. Objective To test whether children who see a movie containing guns will handle a real gun longer and will pull the trigger more times than children who see...

The present research developed a measure for exposure to both antisocial and prosocial media content by revising and extending a previous Content-based Media Exposure Scale (C-ME). The validity and reliability of the C-ME2 was tested in two independent samples (N = 678), among young adults (Study 1) and adolescents (Study 2). Results of Confirmator...

The number of children and adolescents affected by firearm violence are staggering. To help you better understand the public health impact, order this print compendium of AAP editor-curated articles with quick access to the latest most salient studies. https://shop.aap.org/pediatric-collections-firearm-related-injuries-and-preventions-paperback/

In this issue, (Ferguson, C. J., & Donnellan, B. D., Journal of Youth and and Adolescence, published online 21 June 2017) criticize one of our studies (Gabbiadini, A., Riva, P., Andrighetto, L., Volpato, C., & Bushman, B. J., PLoS ONE, 11: 1–14, 2016) that found violent sexist video games can reduce empathy for female violence victims in male playe...

There is little research on how family violence affects children who live the Arab world. This study had three aims. First, to examine the prevalence of family violence in Yemen. Second, to examine the associations between family violence and internalizing and externalizing problems in Yemeni children. Third, to examine participant gender as a poss...

The mere presence of weapons can increase aggression—called the “weapons effect.” Weapons are theorized to increase aggression by priming aggressive thoughts. This research tested the robustness of the weapons effect using two large representative samples of American adults (total N = 1,097). Participants saw photos of criminals, soldiers, police i...

A large meta-analysis by Anderson et al. (2010) found that violent video games increased aggressive thoughts, angry feelings, physiological arousal, and aggressive behavior and decreased empathic feelings and helping behavior. Hilgard, Engelhardt, and Rouder (2017) reanalyzed the data of Anderson et al. (2010) using newer publication bias methods (...

Hot temperatures lead to heightened arousal. According to excitation transfer theory, arousal can increase both antisocial and prosocial behavior, depending on the context. Although many studies have shown that hot temperatures can increase antisocial behavior, very few studies have investigated the relationship between temperature and prosocial be...

Hot temperatures lead to heightened arousal. According to excitation transfer theory, arousal can increase both antisocial and prosocial behavior, depending on the context. Although many studies have shown that hot temperatures can increase antisocial behavior, very few studies have investigated the relationship between temperature and prosocial be...

A total of 80 authors working in a variety of scientific disciplines commented on the theoretical model of CLimate, Aggression, and Self-control in Humans (CLASH). The commentaries cover a wide range of issues, including the logic and assumptions of CLASH, the evidence in support of CLASH, and other possible causes of aggression and violence (e.g.,...

The General Aggression Model (GAM) is a comprehensive, integrative, framework for understanding aggression. It considers the role of social, cognitive, personality, developmental, and biological factors on aggression. Proximate processes of GAM detail how person and situation factors influence cognitions, feelings, and arousal, which in turn affect...

The CLimate, Aggression, and Self-control in Humans (CLASH) proposes that aggression and violence increase as climates become hotter and seasonal variation becomes smaller by influencing time-orientation and self-control. Emerging empirical evidence supporting the model is reviewed. Wealth, income inequality, and pathogen stress as powerful influen...

Objectives. To test the hypothesis that violence among US adolescents spreads like a contagious disease through social networks. Methods. Participants were a nationally representative sample of 90 118 US students aged 12 to 18 years who were involved in the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health. Violence was assessed by having participan...

It is somewhat ironic that although youth today are saturated in media, no standardized instrument exists to measure individual’s exposure to specific media content. Therefore, we developed and validated a scale to measure both the frequency and content of adolescents’ media exposure which measures media exposure regardless of media channel: the Co...

Research has shown that exposure to violent media increases aggression. However, the neural underpinnings of violent-media-related aggression are poorly understood. Additionally, few experiments have tested hypotheses concerning how to reduce violent-media-related aggression. In this experiment, we focused on a brain area involved in the regulation...

In many societies, weapons are plentiful and highly visible. This review examines recent trends in research on the weapons priming effect, which is the finding that the mere presence of weapons can prime people to behave aggressively. The General Aggression Model provides a theoretical framework to explain why the weapons priming effect occurs. Thi...

Many people today are immersed in media similar to fish in water. Electronic devices provide virtually unlimited access to media. Although people consume media during their waking hours, the media they consume might also affect their dreams during sleeping hours. The media often contain violence and sex. On the basis of cognitive neoassociation the...

Many people today are immersed in media similar to fish in water. Electronic devices provide virtually unlimited access to media. Although people consume media during their waking hours, the media they consume might also affect their dreams during sleeping hours. The media often contain violence and sex. On the basis of cognitive neoassociation the...

Recent research documents an increase in narcissism in the United States. Little research, however, has explored mechanisms that could cause higher narcissism. In 2 studies, we test the hypothesis that exposure to narcissistic reality TV characters is related to greater narcissism for those engaging in experience taking (Kaufman & Libby, 2012). Stu...

At the request of the Journal Editor(s) and the Publisher and/or the author(s), the following article has been retracted. Çetin, Y., Wai, J., Altay, C., & Bushman B. J. (2016). Effects of violent media on verbal task performance in gifted and general cohort children. Gifted Child Quarterly, 60(4), 279-287. doi: 10.1177/0016986216660382 Joseph Hilga...

In responding to the published comments on our SPSSI Research Summary on Media Violence, we note that several key themes emerge. In assessing the media violence research evidence, it is more informative and less biased to draw conclusions based on the full range of findings than to emphasize findings from individual studies. Using the full range of...

Worldwide there are substantial differences within and between countries in aggression and violence. Although there are various exceptions, a general rule is that aggression and violence increase as one moves closer to the equator, which suggests the important role of climate differences. While this pattern is robust, theoretical explanations for t...

Objective: This study aims to establish a cut score for the Inventory of Callous-Unemotional Traits, a well-validated measure of callous-unemotional (CU) traits in youth for which there is currently no cutoff score. Method: We analyzed data on 634 adolescents from high schools (n = 343) and juvenile detention centers (n = 291). Participants, the...

Hostile people tend to view the world as a hostile place. Although there are individual differences in hostile world-views, situational factors can also play a role. For example, scenes of violence in the mass media might influence people to view the world as a hostile place. This meta-analysis aggregates, for the first time, all studies that have...