Directors of bloody flicks like Blade II and Hannibal may be reaching a younger audience than they anticipate, as Dartmouth Medical School researchers have found that an average of 12.5 percent of children ages 10 to 14 have seen movies rated R for violence by the Motion Picture Association of America. The team found that exposure to "extremely violent" movies was linked to heritage, education and socioeconomic background.
The team conducted the research to fill what they saw as a gap in a field that has previously focused more on the effects of childhood exposure to media, according to the study.
"We know so much about the harmful effects of exposure to violent media content, but how much exposure children actually get has been largely ignored," Keilah Worth, lead author of the study and a post-doctoral fellow at DMS and Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center's Norris Cotton Cancer Center, told the Office of Public Affairs in a press release. "Now, we're learning more about the large numbers of kids seeing this material and who they are."
The researchers gathered data by conducting a random-digit-dial phone survey of more than 6,000 American adolescents, asking respondents if they had seen each of 50 movie titles of various MPAA ratings. The team randomly selected from a pool of top U.S. box-office movies from the five years preceding the data collection, according to the study.
The study estimated that 22 children in the U.S. have been exposed to one of the violent movies included in the survey. Scary Movie was the film seen by the most respondents, as 48.1 percent of adolescents surveyed reported they had seen the movie.
Survey respondents were also asked if they had seen Blade II or Hannibal, both movies that met the research team's requirements for classification as "extremely violent." The team labeled these movies as "extremely violent" based on their frequency and salience of violence, as well as their classification under MPAA and United Kingdom ratings board criteria.
According to the survey, several independent risk factors were associated with exposure to "extremely violent" movies. Boys, minorities, those from lower socioeconomic backgrounds and respondents with low school performance were all found to be more likely to have seen the movies.
Black adolescent males were the group at the highest risk of seeing "extremely violent" movies. The study found that black adolescent males were 5.5 times more likely than white adolescent males to have seen at least one of the "extremely violent" movies.
Citing previous research that links exposure to media violence to increase in violent thoughts, emotions and behavior, the team encouraged parents to limit their children's exposure to violent movies. The study noted, however, that with advances in entertainment technology, including DVDs with "unrated" movie versions, movie channels, pay-per-view channels and Web-based movie downloads, it is easier for adolescents to access films without their parents' knowledge.
This study was one of many research projects the team has conducted that investigate a link between adolescent behavior and movie exposure, according to the OPA press release.
The National Institutes of Health and the American Legacy Foundation partially funded the research.
The Dartmouth was unable to reach the authors of the study for further comment by press time.
