Does television violence cause aggression?

W ITH the increasing prominence of vio-lence in our society, social scientistshave been turning their attention to the antecedents of aggressive behavior in children and adults. Television programming with its heavy emphasis on interpersonal violence and acquisi-tive lawlessness has been assigned a role both in inciting aggression and teaching viewers specific techniques of aggressive behavior. The relation between overt aggression and television habits has been demonstrated in a few survey studies which, however, because of the nature of surveys have not been able to discriminate cause and effect (Bailyn, 1959; Eron, 1963; Schramm, Lyle, Parker, 1961). On the other hand, manipulative laboratory ex-periments have demonstrated an immediate effect on the extent of aggressive behavior of subjects who have witnessed aggressive displays on film (Ban-